Help amassing wealth

[dobriensd]

I am a beginner player attempting to learn the rudiments of the game (while having fun doing so btw) and wondered as to the basics of starting to amass wealth. I start the game, usually, with less than 100 gold, and basically it stays around the same amount or gets incrementally larger and then if I am engaged begins draining.

What is a good strategy to start keeping my gold, saving it, and therefore having it available to use for other things - I have never built anything or asassinated anyone due to lack of wealth

What are the basics? What is a good strategy to lay a foundation for wealth generation, if that's possible?

 

[CB60]

Well, build the first castle village upgrade for one, then maybe the first wall upgrade, then the second village upgrade. Raise city taxes when you can. A good Steward is important, try poaching one from another court who's unhappy with his liege. If you need cash in a hurry (to hire mercenaries for example) set your steward to collect taxes rather than research. And of course, go forth and conquer!

It takes a decade or so for the cash to start rolling in.

 

[Gheald]

build buildings.. Specifically the castle town upgrades in Baronies and Counties you personally own. That will have the largest impact in the early stages of the game and as long as you don't lose those holdings they will continue to generate your wealth over the generations. Some people also like to raise taxes.. Increased city taxes will net you a small increase in early stages of the game but if you are able to expand your territory it will generate more and more cash especially if you make some Lord-Mayors and Doges.

 

[Malvius]

You should build/upgrade all your Castle Towns in your Castles (Your Castles)
After a time you will get more and more Gold with it.

Also you should minimaze (written wrong? Don't care) the City/Church levies but
raise hte City/Church Taxation

 

[Casiru]

The best way of improving cash flow at the start in my experience is to capture barons/counts/mayors etc in a war. Its 10/25/70/140 or something for landless(not always wanted)/minor/count/duke. If you get luck and capture a duke who can afford bail you can make like 5 years gold in a moment if you only have one county.
Upgrading holdings and increasing demesne size is also important but having feudal vassals won't give you any gold if you don't tax them. Feudal taxes only become a good source of income in really huge countries like the HRE.

 

[Talq]

Build castle village etc (& walls if necessary first).

Increase the size of your demense (ie the number of counties you own directly). There are a few methods of doing this - if you are a duke or king you can (usually) plot to revoke other counts in your capital's duchy, or counts with more than one province. Otherwise, you can fabricate claims (with your chancellor), or inherit them (or the land).

Be wary of using the summer fair, feast, hunting decisions. They have their uses, but their cost is scaled to your income - use them every year, and you will find yourself not making money.

 

[grisamentum]

All terrible advice. Those are all ways to make a couple gold here, a couple gold there.

The real way to make money as a small count (assuming you start with 1 mayor vassal and 1 bishop vassal) -

1. imprison and banish all your vassals
2. use the money to hire mercenaries and conquer your neighbors
3. imprison all their vassals and banish them, too
4. repeat

i've had upwards of 20,000 gold after doing this. once you get bored of it just generate a bunch of vassals to take over your excess holdings.

pretty much every problem in this game can be solved by "imprison everyone and banish them" and i really wish paradox would do something about it.

 

[Beagá]

Ransom of prisioners or banishment of the douchebags works wonders. Watch for tyranny, however.

 

[grisamentum]

Ransom of prisioners or banishment of the douchebags works wonders. Watch for tyranny, however.

tyranny is completely meaningless. all it means is that you have more incentive to banish more people.

 

[Beagá]

I know, but I´m speaking about playing in a non gamey way and doing things in moderation (that is, not abusing mercenaries, above all).

 

[grisamentum]

The mechanics are what they are. If using a certain mechanic feels too "gamey" that's a problem with the game and it should be fixed.

 

[noobermenschen]

Rack the Burghers! Always max out city taxes - I generally put city levies on minimum to compensate somewhat.

If you need to slim down your demesne consider handing some counties or duchies to Lord Mayors and Doges, especially if they are coastal provinces with a lot of extra building slots. Republic held cities get a +15% bonus to income, +40% if coastal and a Doge gets an extra +100% for his capitol city.

BEWARE: Managing relations with these critters is tricky. In addition to harsh city tax opinion hit (not much point in having them otherwise, and they gain quite a bit of wealth as is) You get a -30% opinion hit with these vassals for "wrong government type" and you have no control over succession, so if the province is (or was recently) a different culture and/or religion you may have to deal with a successor who holds a foreigner/infidel opinion gripe against you. On the plus side they don't care about crown authority and like you more if you have elective succession so are usually not much worse than nobles who are family members. Most if not all of my honorary titles are handed out to Doges. They also tend to die in battle or under suspicious circumstances quite often. Whatever it takes to keep the bitches in line.

 

[Ahaz Flagg]

I have found the best build order to be as follows for good gold flow and tech flow. 1st and foremost, revoke all land in your realm until you are maxed in demense, then take the rest and make lord mayors.
1 Castle Town level 1
2 level 3 walls
3 Castle Town 2 and 3.
4 Church Schools 1-2 in all bishoprics.
5. Unis in all cities
6. Build cities in all empty slots, use judgement, I have found at least 1 barony is also good.
7 Build unis in new cities.
8. Buld any castle city upgrades.
9. Start to work on levies, your culture troop is best to start with imho.

This will have you rolling in gold and tech, slow levy start but you will not lack for gold. This will not work if you are constanly under attack, if you are you need levies first, so just do a few castle town upgrades and then go levies. With 7-8 in your demense, you will pocket anywhere from 430-520 gold per year. Could be a lot more if you go vassal crazy, but then you will be complaing about factions. Small realms = stable realms, and you can marry sons to become Dukes, and control land that way.

Just a few notes, I never raise taxes ever. I always go for max levies instead, slower start, but way less hassel keeping mayors happy. And if you want gold flow, you want happy mayors. You have to mix and match until you find something that works. 280 years so far into my current game, not once did I have a rebellion. I am currently raking in 280 gold per year, and have no taxes at all.*lowered to 0 because nonthing left to spend gold on* My mayors love me, and I am # 12 in military and have only 8 demense and 2 vassals. My dynasty controls 3 kingships, and 25 dukedoms and numerous counts. I have nothing to spend gold on, and prefer to marry into control. I can pretty much point and people will come to be councilors.

I think unhappy realms are direct result of to high levies and taxes.

 

[Heartsbane]

All terrible advice. Those are all ways to make a couple gold here, a couple gold there.

The real way to make money as a small count (assuming you start with 1 mayor vassal and 1 bishop vassal) -

1. imprison and banish all your vassals
2. use the money to hire mercenaries and conquer your neighbors
3. imprison all their vassals and banish them, too
4. repeat

i've had upwards of 20,000 gold after doing this. once you get bored of it just generate a bunch of vassals to take over your excess holdings.

pretty much every problem in this game can be solved by "imprison everyone and banish them" and i really wish paradox would do something about it.

I find myself banishing my mayors more often than not as a count just to get the initial startup funds needed for conquest ie a couple fabricated claims and mercenaries. I'm not sure what they should do to"fix" this as you should be able to imprison and banish people as a ruler. Only real downside of doing this as a count is if the imprison attempt fails and they revolt against you. It happened to me where my mayor escaped capture and revolted and I didn't have enough troops to take his holding so we were stuck in a permanent stalemate

It does become less fun and practical once you become King though and you are way over your demesnes limit, not making any money, and half the game mechanics aren't available to you because you have no vassals :laugh:

Anyway, taking this route isn't recommended for a beginner as it is an exploit and you should learn every aspect of the game mechanics and the economy. Easiest thing to do is to start as a Duchy with a decent amount of Counties, I would recommend Flanders. It has a 7 holding capital in Brugge and starts with 6 counties, with 3 of them being coastal. Use the plots menu to revoke the counties from your vassals (you will only need one backer) and fight token wars when they refuse. Crank up city taxes to harsh since they won't rebel and unless you plan on making a lot of prince bishoprics crank up temple taxes as well. Have your steward collect taxes in your capital and start building. Build ports ASAP for 100 gold, then build villages in your cities and castles. Build wall upgrades, and when you get enough money start building new cities in your coastal provinces and build more ports. You can build castles in your interior but for coastal provinces, cities are best. Wage wars to gain more money as you can net some decent gold from conquest. Once you are bring in 10 gold a month you should be in good shape for the early game but just keep building economy buildings and don't worry too much about your armies. The 75 gold mercenaries are quite viable in the early game and once you have conquered enough land to form a decent sized kingdom you won't be using mercenaries much anyways.

These tips can be sued for most Duchy level characters but if you are a landlocked province you obviously won't get the benefits of ports. Still, maintain control of as many counties within your demesnes as possible, raise burgher taxes, and focus on economy buildings and you should be rolling in gold in no time. You could also create Lord Mayors by giving a mayor a county level holding and they will give you lots of gold in taxes but they have a permanent -30 opinion penalty towards you so be wary.

 

[dorukdorucu]

UNLEASH YOUR INNER VIKING!
Go forth and siege holdings, every holding you succesfully siege gives you gold. Have no CB against anyone? Don't worry, look for a faction war in a neighbouring country and join it on the defenders side. Siege a couple holdings, then go back. Wait for the enemy to take them back. Rinse & Repeat. Also, go fight in battles. Barons can be ransomed for 20 gold, counts 70, dukes 140 and kings... well never imprisoned a king myself lol
It's also better to use mercenaries for this, as they reinforce. Retinues do the same thing if you have LoR as well. However, they also cost gold to maintain so your net gain will be less.

 

[yezhanquan]

Once you are able to, pick fights with infidels. As mentioned above, sieges are cool if you're running a pure-levy army.

 

[Divi]

Unless you're paying for every city upgrade yourself, don't follow their advice with cities, they're worth more money improved. Medium with improvements is worth a lot more than 100% of a glorified village.

 

[Ahaz Flagg]

Unless you're paying for every city upgrade yourself, don't follow their advice with cities, they're worth more money improved. Medium with improvements is worth a lot more than 100% of a glorified village.

Are you suggesting it is bad idea to build cities? And no, you do not need to upgrade the cities you build, your mayors will unless you make it so they cannot.

 

[Beagá]

I wonder if it´s worth it to save monies to build a holding.

 

[Zakath]

Are you suggesting it is bad idea to build cities? And no, you do not need to upgrade the cities you build, your mayors will unless you make it so they cannot.

It takes a while before a new Mayor will start improving his city, especially if you jack up the taxes, so I sometimes kickstart it with a building or two after it's built. Depends on my financial situation really, but by the time I start building cities everywhere I usually have a few gold to spare.

Of course, I first improve my own castle villages as far as I can. Then I found and fund cities.