My town's prosperity is increasing!

[Hughes]

To address the many other threads about town and village prosperity, after about 200 days of devoted care for Dhirim (and its hinterlands, also belonging to me, of Ushkuru, Burglen, Yalibe and Amere), I've managed to get its prosperity up from Poor to Average.

When I got Dhirim, it had changed hands about seven times (between the Swadians, Nords, Vaegirs, Khergits and Rhodoks). All of its villages were constantly being raided and burnt. The guild master told me they were the poorest town in Calradia, more affected by bandits than 18 towns, more visited by caravans than most towns, more productive than many towns and had the most productive hinterland in all of Calradia.

Once I took it back for Swadia, I built up a ~300-man garrison and have been trying to keep it and the surrounding hinterland as peaceful as possible. It seemed to me that given its productivity and trading, then as long as it can be kept from getting sieged/captured or plagued by bandits, it could be rich.

It may just be a fluke, but it seems like my efforts are paying off. I haven't been doing anything different from what's been suggested in other threads, namely:

- Finding out from the Guild Master what they're short of
- Tirelessly ferrying goods back to Dhirim over and over again. Smoked fish from Tihr, Wine from Suno, Ale from Praven, Flax from Sargoth, you name it. And if I acquire other commodities (say, silk looted from a bandit camp I hit during my merchant runs), I sell it to Dhirim too.
- Buy iron produced there and sell it at Suno/Praven to increase its treasury.
- Pick up bread, dried meat, and any other shortage commodities in little villages and sell them at Dhirim.
- Protect villages from being raided.
- Build mills in Dhirim's villages.
- Kill any and all bandits or deserters I see anywhere near my villages during my merchant runs.
- See caravans safely in and out of my territory.

Basically, I've been flooding Dhirim with goods, acquired by any means necessary, and protecting it and its villages from harm.

During this time I've had some summons from the Marshal every now and then, or had to race back to protect a village from getting raided by whoever we're at war with at the time, but basically my life for nearly a year has been getting needed goods to Dhirim.

About a week ago (game time) all my villages completed building mills, jumped to Average (from poor) and Dhirim followed shortly after.

I'm concerned that it's just luck, because as far as I know, the reason the designers included a guid master with economic information is just so that players can know what they can sell there and make money doing it - not to actually allow the player to affect the overall town prosperity. But it seems to be doing something, unless maybe it's just that it hasn't been sieged lately. Now, Dhirim is in the middle of the map, so as i mentioned before, it sees a lot of traders, so maybe it's harder to graduate other towns on the edges that don't get so many caravans. And maybe it sinks back into poverty tomorrow for some reason, or that I can never get it to rich. But so far so good. Just thought those of you grappling with the WB economy might want to hear about it.

 

[Cro]

What does town prosperity do for you?  Is it worth the effort? I've had Dhirim in both of my games so far and both times it stayed poor despite getting more trade than anywhere else and having no bandits to speak of.

 

[UnfortunateCrow]

I make a point of keeping the area around Wercheg and it's villages bandit free, and prevent it's villages from getting raided, and it didn't take long for it to be consistantly rich.  I buy my army's food from the villages and sell my loot in Wercheg.  The villages are consistantly rich (sometimes very rich) as well.

 

[Hughes]

Yeah this is exactly what was ticking me off. Dhirim is right in the middle, gets tons of caravans AND has the best hinterland (most productive villages) around. So it seemed to me it SHOULD be really prosperous, not poor and struggling.

As for what prosperity does, well, I don't know I think it increases the income from the town, which is very helpful, to offset the cost of the garrison. But since I haven't gotten it rich yet, I can't tell you It only just turned Average, and I haven't had my weekly income report yet, so I don't know if there's a big jump from before.

I make a point of keeping the area around Wercheg and it's villages bandit free, and prevent it's villages from getting raided, and it didn't take long for it to be consistantly rich.  I buy my army's food from the villages and sell my loot in Wercheg.  The villages are consistantly rich (sometimes very rich) as well.

Good news. I was under the impression from reading other threads that folks were having a hard time getting this to happen and couldn't figure out why.

 

[tarnus]

Great experimenting, i hope that your efforts work, it certainly is too bad that it requires so much effort, more than I'm willing to make (i'm a warmonger nord), but coincidentally I also own Dhirim, but my efforts to increase income revolve more around the whole destruction thing

I've noticed, and this is just an observation, that during peace time, that villages are more likely to become rich or very rich, obviously since they're not being looted, so I think there definitely is a link between Dhirim being poor because it changed hands often and its surrounding lands looted.

 

[Boduar]

They probably figured Dhirim needs some type of handicap for being so well positioned as well as having 5 village incomes.

 

[Hughes]

Well I think it is its own handicap. Being at the crossroads of the world makes it rich but also ripe for getting attacked and its villages always in a state of being looted. Like Istanbul/Constantinople/Byzantium.

 

[UnfortunateCrow]

Getting the prosperity up does increase income.  While tariffs will always be random, the other income is not so much.

In the case of Wercheg, I get about 900/month from the town, and 800 or se each from it's two villages.  Even with no tariffs, I lose only about 200 denars with a garrison of 332 high-tier troops.  Usually the tariffs average about 900 denars though, sometime much lower, sometimes much higher.  In the end, I turn a small profit from the place.

Would be nice if Wercheg had one more village.  You don't need to pay as much attention to the fiefs as the OP did, but you do have to show a consistant vested interest in them, and invest in them to watch them grow.  Like I said earlier, keep the lands bandit free, and protect them.  You won't see results overnight, but in the long run, you will reap great rewards.  Even greater if you don't insist on elite garrisons!

 

[tyrannicide]

so I think there definitely is a link between Dhirim being poor because it changed hands often and its surrounding lands looted.

Just watching the game log tells me that a village getting raided or a town changing owners drops their prosperity by one level.

 

[BlackRainZ]

Ferrying goods to your town wont make much of a difference. Nijis himself said that it wasn't the responsibility of the player to fill the needs of a town concerning goods and such. The caravans are what do that. Getting a town to average isn't exactly a difficult thing. A town can even get as far as rich without doing anything at all. Keeping your caravans safe, and killing every bandit you find is the only real way to keep the prosperity going up. Also keep your town from being attacked as well. I actually changed the amount of bandits in my game to very low and towns and villages gain prosperity much easier so I think bandits have a far much larger impact than buying and selling goods in a town or village.

 

[Hughes]

Very possible. I did see that after 3 or 4 runs with a full inventory of Ale from Praven, Ale no longer showed up on the Guild Master's list of shortages. But that could have been the caravans too.

 

[BlackRainZ]

It was most definitely the caravans.

 

[Arathiel]

I think there may be a link between poor town/productive villages.  In my game, I took Shariz, and it was the poorest town on the map, yet its villages were the most productive.  Conversely, the wealthiest town's villages were mediocre at best.  I bet when a city is really poor, and prices of basic goods go up, the surrounding villages are able to really gouge em, so they make huge profits.  Practically, I don't know what this means.  I would say though, don't be too encouraged by having productive villages... they're quite possibly doing that at the expense of your town.  Or on the flipside... maybe its worth it to get poor towns in order to get good villages with them?  $.02

 

[Boyar]

I took wercheg and now I'm killing bandits around it, and sell their stuff there. I also buy all the salt there and sell it in Curaw, where I buy Iron and sell it in Wercheg.  This brings me a ****load of money and for some reason, the town never gave me less than 1500 denars tariffs not included. I guess I have a bit of luck.

 

[Diavolo]

To be honest I dont think the shortages are things that you know of so you can help the city prosper. I think its there so you can get to know what good you can sell to the city to get a nice profit. Like mentioned, caravans are the best way to prosperity and your money income. "Tarrifs from Dhirim"is based on how many caravans have visited the last week, and is often higher then the normal tax.