[HoneyBadger]

Baalz, you do have a good point about the value of early expansion. Especially in MP but in SP too, you would probably do well using your starting cash to suppliment your initial army with enough troops to form a hard core, and then recruiting Priest Kings and using them to capture slaves.
That way, you'd have the numbers in an average fight, and with enough real troops, you should be able to take a good sized expanse of territory.

You wouldn't really need tons of Sacred troops for that, though, just lots of feathered warriors to give your slaves some backbone.

Example Strategy: I'm playing a game now with gold, resources, and supply all set to minimum.
I combine my starting army and put them all at the right side of the screen so they can charge together when they're done firing slings. The Tribal King in charge I put in the back because he's expensive and I want to be able to use him to capture slaves in the future. I set Magic to Construction because I want those clams, fetishes, Sanguine Dousing Rods, Skull Mentors, and Brazen Vessels.

I'm only able to recruit a couple of Feathered Warriors per turn, and I want to move fast, so I'm only going to wait a couple of months before I send them out.

By the second turn, I've recruited a Priest King and have a total of 10 Feathered Warriors recruited or in the quewe. I choose the Priest King for 3 reasons-1 he can blood-sacrifice, 2 he doesn't start out old, and 3 he can always act as a back-up slave levier if my tribal king dies.

Additional funds go towards Sacred troops, for the first 3 months. After that, I'm buying Priest Kings as often as I can afford them, which will depend mostly on luck.

As soon as I recruit the first Priest-King, I set him to sacrificing. I'll do this for atleast the next 5 Priest Kings I recruit, but after that, additional Priest-Kings will become my core researchers.
One will stay at home, while the other five will spread to neighboring provinces. If I happen to have more than 5 provinces connecting to my home province, then I'll put a Priest-King and a temple in as many as connect to me. I'll raise the defense of those provinces to atleast 25, as quickly as funds allow. I'll set up two castles-as you suggest-close by and put a temple in each one, again with a sacrificing Priest-King. Defense for these, and for my home province, I'll raise to a minimum of 40. That should be enough to give me a nice stable Dominion.

Spreading my priests out makes my Dominion a little more stable, while keeping a bunch close by helps assure that any major loss can be quickly recovered. It also helps spread my Dominion. I just have to make sure my temples are protected, but what else are sacred demons for?

I've got 2 fire gems coming in every turn, that's an extra 30 gold if I alchemize them-and that 30 gold is completely independent of scales. I use that to purchase troops, province defense, and Priest Kings until my Pretender shows up and starts making Soul-Contracts. 12 alchemized fire gems equal 1 Priest King and change.

I don't worry too much about taking the early hit in gems, because I'm going to be setting up a fetish-farm soon enough, and because Mictlan doesn't use a lot of fire gems anyway. Large amounts will come in handy later on when I'm making contracts or casting globals, or when I need lots of cash for province-defense, and that's what the fetish-farm is for.

If I ever get my Pretender empowered in Earth, I'll set up an earth-blood factory too, but right now, fetish-farm is easier (and it sounds more evocative).

I'm surrounded by a lot of tough independents-I set Independent strength to 9-but it looks like the weakest is a local tribe of Lizardmen. I could really use those heavy troops, not to mention lizard shamans, so I send my scout in to get the lay of the land.

It's now mid-fall of the first year.
I've got two Priest-Kings (one of which I bought with alchemized fire gems), and a decent army of 10 feathered warriors, 2 jaguar-warriors (with more on the way) and 40 or so slave warriors. I now Prophetize my second Priest King.
Yes, I could wait and make somebody else my Prophet, but he'll do for now, and I can always get him killed off later on if somebody better comes along. Besides, he makes a decent commander, able to handle 120 troops at a time, and I'm playing a numbers game. It also won't hurt to spread my Dominion.

That's something else you can do to help ease a 2 Dominion-on the first round, make your Tribal King or your Scout your Prophet. You can always switch whichever one out with a better unit once your Dominion is more stable.

My Prophet can cast Divine Bless and Sermon of Courage, and that's what's important right now, because I have a handful of sacred troops and also because all my troops could use the morale boost.

I see an opportunity and I take it. A neighboring province is ruled by a Mound King and held by 30 or so undead horsemen. I've got 3 Priest-Kings by late fall, including my Prophet, and that means lots of banishment opportunities.

It takes me two turns to capture it, but I beat them and the first province is mine! YAY