Example of Optimising Province Wealth

To take an example of decisions regarding optimising a province for income generation, I have chosen a late game instance of Magna Graecia:

Magna Graecia Province Overview
Magna Graecia Province Overview

On the bottom left window it is seen that the public order is perfect and at +5 will remain so, the food is 1 so not draining faction-wide reserves, yet the income is right up at 7797. The province has an inspired populace (left symbol under Province Effects) which gives +6 growth and +8% tax rate, the Tax Harvesting Edict (centre symbol and left tab on the bottom centre window) which gives +30% tax rate, and a wonder, Mt Etna, which gives faction wide bonuses of +3 armour for all units and +2% wealth for agriculture (right symbol).

The financial breakdown is available from the Province Details tab (third from left tab on the bottom centre window):

Magna Graecia Province Details

Here I have hovered over the Tax Harvesting symbol on the bottom left to show the Tax Harvesting bonus popup. The province is being taxed (box ticked to upper left of centre screen, and the contributions of the four settlements to the total tax wealth are listed below the box. The tax rate modifier to this summed wealth is +76%, there are no slaves (told you so!) and corruption gives a negative modifier of -10.7%.

Hovering the pointer over each of the four settlements gives a further breakdown:

Brundisium
Brundisium
Syracuse
Syracuse
Cosentia
Cosentia
Lilybaeum
Lilybaeum

It is seen that the huge bonuses to agriculture and culture wealth (green % figures) greatly increase their contributions above what might be assumed from looking at the “wealth adder” stats from the game encyclopaedia. These bonuses come from the relevant wealth multipliers of every building in every settlement of the province, as well as from faction-wide bonuses that apply to different types of wealth.

Because these wealth bonuses are province-wide or faction-wide, they are equal for different settlements. The exception is maritime commerce because there is less piracy in the sea adjoining Lilybaeum that that adjoining Syracuse.

As an illustration let us consider what effect upgrading has. In the screenshots above, I had just upgraded the market town of Cosentia from level III to level IV.

This would seem the least beneficial upgrade: a town earning at the time 577 wealth, and in the encyclopaedia it shows an increase in subsistence wealth from 250 to 300 and an increase in wealth multiplier of all wealth types of 4% (from +12% to +16%). The cost was 2345 for the upgrade, and an increased food penalty of 4 and an increased public order penalty of 6. Is it worth it?

Before the upgrade I had a public order of +11, so there was no problem suffering the 6 drop there, and my total food surplus was 27, again no problem. When I made the upgrade, the total wealth gain from the province was not 50 but 573. The upgrade will pay for itself in less than 4 turns!

The basic wealth breakdown was previously 2279, 1016, 577 and 662 giving an old final total after modifiers of 7224 instead of 7797. The reason for all these gains is the upgrade’s 4% improvement in all wealth multipliers in all settlements, e.g. from +64% to +68% for subsistence and +179% to +183% for agriculture. The total tax rate after adding these new wealth totals also went from +70% to +76% because the level IV settlement gives an additional boost to the bonus gained through having the Tax Harvesting Edict applied to this province.

This province is by no means the perfect set-up, just an example. There is a spread of level III and level IV buildings with no unique level V buildings. One could maximise by choosing to have the one Circus Maximus for the faction in this province. The extra 6 public order and lack of -10 food penalty over the level IV circus would allow switching a temple for a wealth building in a minor settlement, and also swapping a mainly food producing building such as a farm or the delicatessen for a wealth building in that slot. An agriculture wealth building or a culture wealth building would be good choices because of the massive multipliers to these in that province (agriculture bonuses are high partly because Syracuse is a grain town). The Circus Maximus gives a massive extra 10% bonus to culture wealth as well. Watch out for the -4 public order penalty with the Tax Harvesting Edict from having a Circus Maximus, but it would probably be just about manageable in this case.