Musings on getting the most out of the early game

[Emelio Lizardo]

Humm, I set all my provinces to 90 percent on the idea that I might promote population growth or migration (anyone know if this actually works?). Never bothered to make a prophet until the first ArchAngel, by which time everything on the map was dead or 'gentled down'. This was playing Ulm, indy 9, and I just churned out smiths, spys and Arquebus men/siege bowmen. In a few turns i had my neighbor ai's capitals in raging anarchy, and with little income for the rest of the game. As for sites, I created a special group for that purpose and constantly upgraded them until they could find anything. Thoughest things to find are those pesky level 4 unholy sites. Oddly, the ring of wizardry will upgrade unholy on your basic moundfiend but not holy on your basic holyroller. But that's much later, I just made do with earth & fire for a long time. I do very much agree that hiring mercs early is a must do, if only to kill em off so they don't come back to haunt you later.