Religious Populations?

I'm sure I should know this...

On the annual income report, under taxation, 10% of the population are listed as 'religious'-either called "Church", "Temples", "Mosques", etc.

Who are these people? They can't be trained 'priests' I assume as we train priests. Are they people living on church lands etc?

Are some 'priests' but untrained? If so, if I were to embark on a programme of training priests, could I use part of that population instead of recruits?

Jason wrote:I'm sure I should know this...

On the annual income report, under taxation, 10% of the population are listed as 'religious'-either called "Church", "Temples", "Mosques", etc.

Who are these people?  They can't be trained 'priests' I assume as we train priests.  Are they people living on church lands etc?  

Are some 'priests' but untrained?  If so, if I were to embark on a programme of training priests, could I use part of that population instead of recruits?

I assume that this is the population of Monks and Nuns and others living upon church lands. I am also pretty sure the answer is no, you need to use recruits if you're going for the religious benefit, or if you use these people, then you'll suffer an economic hit as they are part of the economy now. Just like you can go negative recruits, and I can tell you from experience that negative recruits hammers your economy.

I went negative by investing in something that I didn't realized _required_ recruits. If you're starting an entirely new business that your nation has never done before, then you need 1000 recruits for the initial investment...

Also just checked, and for both portugal and spain, and I imagine most nations.

Nobles are 5% of the population, the church is 10%, and the commoners are 85%.

Thanks Deacon

Luckily not been caught out by the negative recruits, however once did round up vagabonds...and my EH fell from "10" to "7" the next turn. Luckily was playing Hanover in G2 at that stage, had so much money (could run the country on the balance in the treasury for 5+ years without any additional income) that the economic downturn was not a problem.

Ah, rounding-up vagabonds - always a pain...

Yes, Vagabonds are a hideously expensive way to get more recruits, if you do the math.

You have to open a workhouse with an upkeep of 10K per year, which takes 2 years(I think) to turn a vagabond into a recruit, so 20 pounds a recruit, not counting the initial cost of the workhouse. And if you don't have exactly 1000 vagabonds to put in the workhouse, then the costs are naturally higher.

I think it would be far cheaper to just buy white slaves out of the north african slave markets and free them.

Think it depends on vagrants; after a year at the workhouse they are ok for trade investment or as settlers but they need another year at another academy for 'professions' (including military service). Guess at least with vagrants at least they are 'local' recruits.

Not tried the 'white slave' idea before, I guess that's a case of sending an ambassador (or similar) to one of the Barbary states and getting them to trawl the slave markets? Might help in certain games...

Well, since the main value of recruits to me is as soldiers or sailors, still quite expensive. I think for a trade investment, it is mostly a wash by math.

10 pounds and a recruit = 10 pounds of investment. 20 pounds of investment without recruits = 10 pounds of investment.

So you'd pay as much to get a trade investment as you'd get in value. Though to be fair, at some point Richard did tell me on a turn when I quizzed him on this subject that initial trade investments tend to do better with recruits attached. No idea how that pencils out though. If you're really trying to perfectly optimize it might be worth doing, but it isn't to me. Particularly since you are never going to get enough vagabonds to do this at any kind of scale. So most of your investing is going to be unpaired with recruits.

And as settlers, you have to pay 10 pounds to settle a recruit. They then no doubt get added to you population and tax base. Assuming you're tax rate is 10% and you commoners are making 2 pounds a year, that's a 20 pounds to net a 20 pence a year in taxes, or a 1% return. (10 pounds of investment, plus the 10 pounds you spent training them to make them usable in a trade investment). Your commoners annual income would have to be 10 pounds a year before you'd even get up to a 5% return on that investment!

I think nearly every other investment in the game is worth more than that. The only reason that might be worth doing is if you've got a vision of building up your colonies and you're not doing it as an investment but as a strategic move.

See the maths re investments of all kinds - but any views on whether "tidying up" the vagabonds does good things for honour or national happiness/productivity?

Tom Blakeney wrote:See the maths re investments of all kinds - but any views on whether "tidying up" the vagabonds does good things for honour or national happiness/productivity?

Not that I'm aware of. In a couple of places I think the rules point out that 'vagabonds' are a part of the economy doing seasonal and other work. When you pay to keep your roads maintained, for instance, you're employing them.

My theory is that they're a focus because over the years so many players have tried various schemes to try to get more recruits than they get. So richard made a very narrow path through which you could get a few more recruits at a very high price.

I think for most nations there are far better options for getting more recruits if you're willing to pay.

There is also the Marine Societies, they can train 50 new recruits each year at an initial cost of 10,000 Guineas and another 10,000 in upkeep. That is 200+ Guineas for each recruit. That is 140,000 Guineas to raise a battalion using such recruits, not including the cost of the battalion itself. They do come ready for use.

I have found in a couple of games recently that I have had problems obtaining recruits from other nations-even when I can easily pay, I seem to not been able to find anyone with recruits to sell or who are willing to let me send out recruiting parties.

Orphanages, marine societies and workhouses are an expensive way to get recruits for sure, but on the other hand, at least they do produce recruits.

Jason wrote:I have found in a couple of games recently that I have had problems obtaining recruits from other nations-even when I can easily pay, I seem to not been able to find anyone with recruits to sell or who are willing to let me send out recruiting parties.  

Orphanages, marine societies and workhouses are an expensive way to get recruits for sure, but on the other hand, at least they do produce recruits.  

I have found that offering bribes to inactive nations often works, but not every year. I think Richard wants to ensure the position remains playable so you can't take all the recruits...

Suspect you're right and I'm glad Richard does We do need dormant positions to be playable when taken on

Hadn't considered bribes really...and I think I need to look into your idea from earlier about buying up white slaves and freeing them

Jason wrote:Suspect you're right and I'm glad Richard does  We do need dormant positions to be playable when taken on

Hadn't considered bribes really...and I think I need to look into your idea from earlier about buying up white slaves and freeing them

In my game 8 conflict with Tunis over harboring pirates, I demanded white slaves as reparations and got them. I imagine many of the markets have them.

I also know in period that a lot of whites were enslaved in the ottoman empire, so you could probably buy in Constantinople as well. Most of the slaves are from Orthodox areas under the Ottoman control or where the various hordes raid.

The majority of the slaves I received were greek, hence Orthodox. I did receive some Venetians as well, which I just freed and sent home.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_the_Ottoman_Empire

Many thanks Deacon Clearly an option to look into

Back on the point of initial trade investment are better with Recruits & money, this makes sense as I suppose the initial infrastructure of the company needs to be set up, whatever you are trading at some point it needs at least an office staff to put the kettle on.

Something which seems not to happen in the game very often is the hiring of troops as Mercenaries many of the smaller German nations turned this into a semi National industry, it seems in most games troops are hired from the Inactive Swiss cantons, but not very often from elsewhere. Historically the Danes had troops in Imperial service, & Hessen Kassel also had troops in various contracts, there are probably other cases I haven' t heard about.

I wonder if it is possible to close down a trade area & get any recruits back, if you have an area that is doing really badly or is under pressure from other players actions?

Anyone know how the recruits for positions like the Pirate Brotherhood are worked out? I take it they don't have huge towns & cities to recruit from?

once the initial investment is done with recruits and money I only used to invest recruits if trying to sell a new commodity I just used to pour money into the market as Russia in game 2 I used to invest about 11 mill each year in my trade and roughly get back a gain of about 8 or 9 mill

J Flower wrote:
Anyone know how the recruits for positions like the Pirate Brotherhood are worked out? I take it they don't have huge towns & cities to recruit from?

I was Blackbeard for three game years in one of the games. I can't remember how recruits worked, whether you receive any every January. I do know that when I took over control of Jamaica (working in the English Crown's name, but siphoning off recruits and money) I received 50 recruits a year from Jamaica.

kingmaker wrote:
I used to invest about 11 mill each year in my trade

Rozwi can only afford five figures sums of money to invest.
Though spending six figures on army upkeep doesn't help

Rozwi_Game10 wrote:

Though spending six figures on army upkeep doesn't help

If you're spending so much on the army you can't afford to improve your economy, then it's time to invade a neighbor. No kidding.

You need to invest more for growth by the sound of things. If your army is costing you so much, why not put large numbers in reserve.? You will still have them but they will not cost you as much.

Yep, no worries, the army is central to my plans.

I've been working on the army from turn one of game 10, a complete over-haul and retraining program. The entire process will be complete soon.

Farming and general food production is my other goal for the position. I've got the economics all balanced on paper, so things are fine in regard not ruining Rozwi.

The trouble with the economy is the fact that large settlements are few and far between in Southern Africa. I started with one 'city' which I provided some details for and have now seen them be accepted as 'fact' in the game. I invested in a few other locations inside Rozwi's borders and provided some small info about the locations, and Agema has now confirmed as 'fact' most of them. So Rozwi started with a one settlement as the capital, with no gazette info., but my Rozwi now has five inhabited areas with in-game details regarding population numbers and historic fact, and as I'm investing into other locales just outside of our borders these might also be recognised, as and when Agema finds the time to do so, in game 10.

Though it takes so long to travel between the closest of places in Southern Africa no journey is completed fast, obviously not helping trade.

As an example of travelling time: (this isn't me moaning, as all this is obviously historical and does have its benefits)

In Europe a named player character could reach from A to B inside of one month - In the newspaper it's often noted that a player's character started the month in one city, but finished the month in another around 100 miles away. This wouldn't be possible with Rozwi, you'd reach the place next month.

In Europe, with all its roads and canals to aid transport and communications, a caravan of goods might take 3 months to get from A to B. In Southern Africa, my load of tobacco travelling from Mozambique to Rozwi (we're neighbouring countries) is taking 6 months.

Troop movement due to heat, wildlife, wilderness, poor to no roads, is also affected.

But its all good fun and I'm enjoying it. Rozwi is the game position, out of the five I've played now since 1998, that is the one that's 'clicked' for me, and I feel completely at ease and understanding of it. I've had three European game positions and I just couldn't get a feel for them, but this Tribal African game position just feels natural to me. Strange that

By and large this game is historical. So I suppose an African position will always be light on trade income. Invasion is always a good way of building your position. I always look to invade myself. I enjoy that side of the game.

I know what you mean about a position "clicking", feel the same way when playing a Chinese position. Don't get me wrong, enjoy playing Scotland in G10 as well as the other positions I've played, but there is something about playing China. Maybe it is the relative freedom? Do seem to get a greater sense of achievement when I managed to build canals, develop certain technologies that are common in European positions...

Deacon wrote:

Jason wrote:Suspect you're right and I'm glad Richard does  We do need dormant positions to be playable when taken on

Hadn't considered bribes really...and I think I need to look into your idea from earlier about buying up white slaves and freeing them

In my game 8 conflict with Tunis over harboring pirates, I demanded white slaves as reparations and got them. I imagine many of the markets have them.

I also know in period that a lot of whites were enslaved in the ottoman empire, so you could probably buy in Constantinople as well. Most of the slaves are from Orthodox areas under the Ottoman control or where the various hordes raid.

The majority of the slaves I received were greek, hence Orthodox. I did receive some Venetians as well, which I just freed and sent home.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_the_Ottoman_Empire

While the ransoming a few captives held by the Ottomans is a kind and Christain deed.

In one game Venice ran into lots of diplomatic problems as the Doge offering really high prices to buy captives from the Khan of the Golden Horde triggered a waive of Slave raids into Hungary, Poland & Russia to supply the Doge. Half of Eastern Europe wanted to hang the Doge as a White Slaver. While the Sultan was not exactly happy on finding out the Venetain "recruiting" was liable to start a war with a very upset Hapsburgs, Winged Hussars, Cossacks etc.

Likewise if you start funding Barbary Corsairs you tend to annoy the raided merchants and communities in the Med who complain to their Govts and Richard lowers their honour if they dont do something.