Noob player question

[free jack]

Hey, im new to Vicky and am just getting to grips with this complex game. The thing is i dont understand how to get any money at the beginning of the game. When i start a new game im always losing like £100 a day and other than putting tax to maximum and nothing on army maintenece, education etc. Am i missing something or is it just solid to make any money.

 

[JoeGiavani]

Post a screen shot of your budget screen so we can see what you're spending money on, and where you're missing out.

 

[free jack]

thats the only way i could really get it to balance whilst still maintaining my army, or is it unrealistic to try and maintain the army 100%

 

[TheFlemishDuck]

You can put youre poor class tax above 50% and that still can be ok, but i wouldn't set my middle class tax over 50% ever, as clerks will demote, rich class might demote with tax over 50% to but sometimes thats part of strategy, yet i would put it at 50% usually too for the whole game.

You should go maximum on tarrifs, it's a good source of income that won't mess up anything in youre country, you have it way to low atm.

Same with education and crime fighting, i always keep those sliders at 100%.

You have a high army spending and thats whats making youre budget hard, obviously you should cut some costs there. (well next to obviously getting the full money from tarrifs)
What i emmediatly noticed though is the high cost of your manpower slider (defense spending) even at it's lowest. You clearly have way to much soldier pops atm, you should start to demobilize soldiers into workers again, a manpower slider that costs more at lowest spending than a full paid millitary is really rediculous.

 

[LlywelynII]

Ok, the first focus with Mexico (or really any state that isn't the UK) is education. Set it all the way to the right and lock it by double clicking. VIPeR has some nasty criminals that might take fending off, but the main thing to realize is that crime funding should go to 0, 50 or 100% and that half-measures in between are mostly a waste of cash, iirc.

You don't want to go at 50% or higher on your taxes for a number of reasons - set your taxes to 49 point whatever (22, I think) - anyhow, whatever is just under 50. Lock those by double clicking.

Set your tariffs as high as you can (your screenshot says you can go to 100% - go ahead.) Then go through your provinces and split any POPs larger than 40k - each one will be less efficient on their own but your RGOs and factories will be more efficient for having more workers.

At that point you should be fine - expect to run a little in the red during wars if you want to win them and crush the Texans as fast as possible, being sure to use a cav unit to pick up their claims.

Alliances with the UK or France might help make the US think twice about DOWing you over the West, but otherwise you might have to keep a sizeable standing army, which would be unfortunate. If you have to keep it anyway, use it to bully your neighbors to the south and east into paying protection.

Don't use this on Texas, though, since they'll just integrate into the US and you won't get anything; and don't satellite any of them, since you won't get any resources or cash and you won't be able to DOW them again.

The last thing would be to click the largest capi you've got, making sure he has 100% of his necessary and everyday goods paid for, and run the clock a little to make sure he's accumulating cash. If he is, you'll start getting free railroads and factories in the future; if he's not, you need to ease off his taxes and the tariffs as much as you can afford to allow him to pay for everything.

 

[TheFlemishDuck]

You don't want to go at 50% or higher for a number of reasons - set your taxes to 49 point whatever (22, I think) - anyhow, whatever is just under 50. Lock those by double clicking.

Thats an old misconception, setting tax at 50% is just the same as setting them at 49.2%, pops won't demote at 50%, only when you set them over 50%. So you can perfectly set it at 50% for the whole game.

It looks clear to me that in his specific case he has way to much soldier pops. at 1/3rd of manpower pool spending he still needs to couch up ùore than 50£ daily, and thats more than what his whole standing army costs, so thats pretty rediculous, i bet if he'd pay his manpower slider at full he would have a max of 100's of manpower worth, and his army seems to be fully paid and fully manned seeing from his costs. Not only is this a large cost, but with less pops in RGO's his income goes down to, so i'm pretty sure that demobilizing pops is his first priority here asside of setting a more sensible budget and deffinatly setting his tarrifs slider to the utmost right.

 

[OHgamer]

drop taxes and raise tariffs. tariffs affect consciousness only, while taxes, if below 33%, can actually reduce militancy growth.

also why is your army spending at max. Unless you are planning to go to war immediately, I recommend keeping army maintenance fairly low (but keep defense spending full). that way you'll continue to grow your manpower pool should an emergency arise, but do not have to keep the high cost of maintenance of existing armies that are just sitting around doing nothing - again unless you are planning a war in the next few months.

though looking at your military i have to ask, did you do a massive expansion of your armed forces?? that defense spending cost seems really, really high.

 

[Orm]

Cut to minimum army maintenance for one day, then back up again. Your standing divisions will be brought down in size and will cost less to field, and you can easily bring them back up to full size again if the need arises.

 

[LlywelynII]

Thats an old misconception, setting tax at 50% is just the same as setting them at 49.2%, pops won't demote at 50%, only when you set them over 50%. So you can perfectly set it at 50% for the whole game.

I knew that, but was under the impression that militancy would rise starting at 50.00. Also a misconception?

It looks clear to me that in his specific case he has way to much soldier pops.

He's at war with Texas & his military starts out iirc underpopulated.

If Mexico starts with too many soldier POPs for balanced play, to the point where any player has to waste time demobbing them every time, it's a problem with scenario design and not noob play.

Unless you are planning to go to war immediately,

*koff*

 

[JoeGiavani]

Your defence spending is FAR too high, it's probably caused by either too many soldiers or too many officers, either way I'd recommend not having more than 5% of your POPs as soldiers, 10% in a serious war. To that end, I'd recommend demobilizing as many POPs as you can, which will mean you'll be able to keep the slider all the way to the right, while not spending too much.
As other have said, always, ALWAYS have education slider on max, and I'd keep your army maintainance on the lowest setting, putting it up to full a month or two in advance of a war.

 

[TheFlemishDuck]

I knew that, but was under the impression that militancy would rise starting at 50.00. Also a misconception?

Ah ... well im not sure about that one ...

He's at war with Texas & his military starts out iirc underpopulated.

If Mexico starts with too many soldier POPs for balanced play, to the point where any player has to waste time demobbing them every time, it's a problem with scenario design and not noob play.

this can't be his starting setting, i doubt that mexico would have that many soldier/officer pops at start. Look it costs him 50£ at 1/3rd of the setting, thats just way to much that it's obvious, especially since 100M funding of his millitary costs him less. Normally manpower slider cost is like something along the lines of 1/3rd to 1/5th of arm spending costs even when both are funded fully.

 

[free jack]

Thanks all really helped, been my first succesful game really. Just whooping US which is fun. Thanks