Where did all the money go?

[Rossj]

Playing prussia
1792 scenario

I beat france early on...had about 500 in the bank...income reported at 100...so I'm doing ok.

Poland becomes my protectorate...after several months I notice that my bank account is going down despite the fact that my monthly income is well over 100...I wasn't buying units and I stopped making improvements to my provences...

In Mar 1796 I had $355 in the bank and income of $116...by Sep 1796 (6 months) I had $6 in the bank even though I had made no improvements, bought no units and had a monthly income in the 100 range. What is going on?

[ian77]

Check how much you pay in support costs for your units.

Are you using depot supply?
Are you using forage as much as you could?
Do you have many unneeded depots on the map? - even one eats cash!

Ian

[Rossj]

when i go to the economy page it shows my cost breakouts, which includes military expenditures...

i have two depots and my income level improves if i deselect them, but it still doesn't account for the bad accounting...

by that i mean: if i spend less than i make, my cash should go up...I've played several other powers and not had this problem...it seems like the prussians can't keep the books right.

[Ralegh]

The various economy screens are actually very hard to make sense of - some are before waste and some after, some are last turn actuals and others this turn estimates.

Given what you describe I am pretty confident the problem is supply for the Polish units. You are paying for supply of all divisions in cities (and can't prevent that), as well as any units set to paid supply within range of a depot. I'd say you have a handle on the depots - try moving the city garrisons out of the cities.

[Rossj]

I calculated the value of the polish units and its about 100 per month...still less than the difference between what the nation screen says I will earn and the actual reduction of my cash which is around 130...

I made a similiar experiment as the swedes and becomining protector of denmark...again the economy/nation screen shows income of 50 but it only increases by about 5 per month since the acquisition of denmark...the danish army 4mil, 4inf, 2cav doesn't cost 45 to maintain and it shouldn't cost anything, because denmark should be paying it since they still have controll of their economy...

In the case of poland, their army is huge and their spring levy is significant as well...
so here's my suggestions...

1) protectorates should pay their own way for the armies they raise, future levies and depot supply within the protectorate...

2) if not, the protector should have control of the levy and the nation page should actually show ALL income and expenses...

their are some aspects of the game which are tolerably merky, but the bottomline is that the bottomline should not be a mystery...the financial network of these powers and throughout europe was well defined

[Ralegh]

the financial network of these powers and throughout europe was well defined

I certainly agree that they had a good understanding of the flow of cash and materiel (since they could have it counted), and that COG should do a better job of giving us these numbers.

But my understanding is that the governments of the time didn't have the foggiest how their own economies worked and hence used them badly. How little some things change.

[Hard Sarge]

Hi RossJ
I may be seeing something of the same thing as England in my game

[Rossj]

I agree that their national economies may have been poorly managed...ours probably is too...but they knew how much money was in the treasury and they knew how much it cost to equip and pay an army. The only thing that may have been a wild card was the precise amount of tax revenues...and even that was probably fairly close estimate...

Back to my previous point...if I'm being charged for a protectorates military upkeep then I shouold have control of its economy and levy...

along that same thought, what's the deal with warsaw levying more than they can produce in a year?