Vicky: Who plays it?

[Colonâ„¢]

You should be having a daily surplus in the double digit as well, so you're not exclusively relying on debt to build roalroads. Let's say you should be constructing at least one railroad at any given time.

[dojoboy]

Originally posted by Nikolai
How much is that then?

For me, several hundred thousand pounds.

[dojoboy]

Originally posted by Colon
You should be having a daily surplus in the double digit as well, so you're not exclusively relying on debt to build roalroads. Let's say you should be constructing at least one railroad at any given time.

My approach usually is to slap down rail as long as I have the resources, other than cash, to do so. I always experience a huge rise in daily income when the rail is completed due to the exponential effect of increased industrial efficiency.

[Micha]

Originally posted by Colon
And now I want to know how you managed to avoid the civil war.

Don´t know exactly. Maybe it is related to the events "slavery debates occur in xxx" or something, where I always chose "abolitionist arguments prevail"...

Thanks for all the input on industrialization. One question though:
What positions do you leave the budget sliders in? Especially during the first years?

[Nikolai]

After advice from more experienced players:

Poor taxes around 70-75%
Middle and rich taxes beneath 50%
Max tax on that subsidy slider
Middle and up on education
Zero crime fighting
Max social reform(even if it's 0 it gives a bonus)
Max army
Minimum navy

[Micha]

Thanks...

So my mistake probably is leaving poor taxes beneath 50%... I thought I read somewhere that it was suicide to maintain taxes above 50%?

And max army even out of war? I always drop it to minimum when not in hostilities... also what about the slider that gives manpower and leadership? It´s pretty expensive but I heard it gives prestige

[Colonâ„¢]

I always keep defence up as much as possible, and put army maintenance at zero. If the **** hits the fan you can always up maintenace and reinorce your divisions.

I'd be careful with crime fighting. You can get a lot of corruption easily, it takes a lot of time to clean up and it can *seriously* bog down your economy in the long run. (trusts decrease population growth by 0.7%, for instance)
Basically, if you do not foresee rapid industrialisation in the near the future (in which you can better spend the cash on building factories and the like, eg: Prussia), it'd be wise to keep corruption down.

[Colonâ„¢]

And education should always be max, there are just too many gains in having plenty of technology and a high literacy rate.

And when taxing, I'd be careful not to overdo it, population growth gets screwed if people have too little of their basic needs met.

(but of course all of those are just my opinions, and I'm too cautious for my own good)

[ravagon]

I have it installed, and start it up from time to time but I'm not entirely sure that my puttering around could be called 'playing' so much as scraping through despite an unbelievable level of complete and utter incompetence.

I think it's safe to say that the world would be a very different place today if I'd been running things during the age of industrialisation ...

[Dinner]

Originally posted by dojoboy
My approach usually is to slap down rail as long as I have the resources, other than cash, to do so. I always experience a huge rise in daily income when the rail is completed due to the exponential effect of increased industrial efficiency.

This is the best policy. Raidroads increase income more then anything else plus they mean you can get more economic activity for any given amount of resources. That means even with the same production from RGOs your income and industrial output will climb. What makes it the magic bullet is that as your efficiency rating climbs your rgo output also climbs.

That means you get paid twice every month for each railroad improvement.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Micha
Thanks...

So my mistake probably is leaving poor taxes beneath 50%... I thought I read somewhere that it was suicide to maintain taxes above 50%?

It is suicide. If you raise poor taxes above 50% they can't buy what they need to survive and that makes them extremely militant. They end up rising up and you lose pops while your manpower is all sucked up putting down rebellions.

Instead, close unprofitable factories as soon as you have new factories for the workers to work in. By concentrating on high value goods you can improve your income and climb your way out of the debt trap.

[Henrik]

Originally posted by Oerdin
It is suicide. If you raise poor taxes above 50% they can't buy what they need to survive and that makes them extremely militant. They end up rising up and you lose pops while your manpower is all sucked up putting down rebellions.

I usually keep my poor taxes at about 60-70% and I've never had a problem with revolts

Also as I recall you won't get any immigration if you're in debt which is something one might want to consider...

[Colonâ„¢]

Is anyone interested in a MP game? I like to play to play it somewhat realistically though, so no exploits such as grabbing Chinese provinces for manpower, or colonising Africa as Mexico and the like.

[Ecthy]

I have acquired it, but hardly ever play. The micromanagement plus the lack of success keep me from playing. I just keep going into debt and losing money every day. I managed well as Sweden and Switzerland, but as soon as it's some major nation, I fail to achieve a strong enough economy, which really spoils it a bit.