Quick Beginner Question

[BalooTheScot]

Greetings, all.

Hope, first of all, that I posted this in the right area.

I recently purchased the game and as a stepping stool, fired up a scenario with Sweden, on advanced economic settings. Now, despite what I believed to be good trading decisions, an indicator on the lower portion of the game map that indicated positive generation of 'money' and on my main economic screen a running positive total for generation and total income of a certain number, I was only apparently stockpiling trace amounts per turn.

Suffice to say, I was awash in most other resources, but 'money' just would not grow, despite having all my signs pointing to substantial savings.

Thoughts? Am I just not reading some items correctly?

If you need more information before you reply, just let me know.

Baloo

[BalooTheScot]

Just as an addition to this, I went back and looked into the savegame and noticed that my net income is displayed at the bottom of the screen, yet nothing seems to increase my stockpile of money. I cannot find any sort of 'hidden' issue; I looked through the economy, trade and other tiles, with no results. I have no idea what I am doing wrong.

[06 Maestro]

Greetings BT Scot.

At least you are not going broke-that would be worse.

There are two areas to look at to correct this situation; lower costs and increase income.

The military is the primary drain on the budget. To minimize its expenses put at many high cost divisions into garrison-artillery, cavalry and HQ's. If you have space left over add the infantry to garrison. To save food requirements put as many units you can on forage-this will free up production for other items-items you can use for export.

You can increase your income through taxes , trade and perhaps a treaty/war. Increasing taxes will reduce production so you need to keep an eye on that. However, raise the taxes-a couple points per month. Try to sell some timber-G.B. loves wood. Make sure your provinces are concentrating on producing the items that they are good at. Sell as much as you can. Just beware, if you need to stop a trade it will cost moral (30 IIRC)-so try to make trades that can be sustained.

This should get you on your way to riches-which are just a tool to achieve "glory".

Addit: When you click on the bottom line of the main screen it will shift the display from current stocks to current production. It may be that you are looking at new income which would remain the same. Left click the bottom line.

[morganbj]

Download the Economic guides. They have some pointers for you.