How much can a caravan earn per day ideally?

[Baronsworth]

How long does it take for caravans to start earning decent cash? And how much can I expect to earn from each.

[Scottx125]

It varies. For the first week I made no money. But after a week I made generally around 300-500 gold. Sometimes it would go up to 1.5k but it'd go back down.

[Baronsworth]

Alright, thanks man.

[ghyslain]

In my experience, expect your caravans to really ramp up their income within their first month of operation. Start off netting you -150$/day (negative income) and ends up averaging you 400-1000$/day (a wild guess since the income fluctuates a lot).

While you're still an independent clan, this is a great way to lay a solid economic foundation. It is in my opinion the best return on investment you can get at this stage of the game. For instance, always go for Caravans first then you can further invest into workshops.

But upon joining a kingdom and getting involved into wars, you might end up turning a deficit with said caravans if they choose to take dangerous route and get captured repeatedly. Indeed, every time a caravan gets captured, you'll need to first go and meet up with your companion (he might be in a far away city as well) and then recreate a caravan for 15k.

Make of that what you want.

Good luck !

[Baronsworth]

Originally posted by ghyslain:

In my experience, expect your caravans to really ramp up their income within their first month of operation. Start off netting you -150$/day (negative income) and ends up averaging you 400-1000$/day (a wild guess since the income fluctuates a lot).

While your still an independent clan, this is a great way to lay a solid economic foundation. It is in my opinion the best return on investment you can get at this stage of the game. For instance, always go for Caravans first then you can further invest into workshops.

But upon joining a kingdom and getting involved into wars, you might end up turning a deficit with said caravans if they choose to take dangerous route and get captured repeatedly. Indeed, everything a caravan gets captured, you'll need to first go and meet up with your companion (he might be in a far away city as well) and then recreate a caravan for 15k.

Make of that what you want.

Good luck !

Damn, so we need good warriors to lead those caravans.

[ghyslain]

It won't matter much regarding how good the companion leading the caravan is, due to the sheer amount of units involved on both side of an auto-resolve combat he might face. It will help a bit, but think about it this way : if you get the best possible warrior with say 200 skills in melee stuff vs an average guy at 100 skills in melee, your elite warrior companion is basically worth 2 regular caravan troops in terms of fighting skills. What really ends up improving the odds of survival of a caravan is hoping they get to grow their escort party over time, as when they're freshly starting up, they are only 30 members strong. Over time, they can grow up to 90. And finally, you need to hope they don't run into the middle of a kingdom with whom you're at war with.

I'll repeat this here : if you're at peace/haven't joined a kingdom yet, caravans are 100% the way to go. They will kickstart your run economically speaking like no other options could.

[Ri0Rdian]

Does it depend on where you base the caravan at or will they move all over the place anyway, so you might as well use the closest city?

And how often do you see them get destroyed? (I have seen a perk about insurance for them but I both guess it does not work and 5k is just 30% so...)

[Scottx125]

Originally posted by ghyslain:

It won't matter much regarding how good the companion leading the caravan, due to the sheer amount of units involved on both side of an auto-resolve combat he might face. It will help a bit, but think about it this way : if you get the best possible warrior with say 200 skills in melee stuff vs an average guy at 100 skills in melee, your elite warrior companion is basically worth 2 regular caravan troops in terms of fighting skills. What really ends up improving the odds of survival of a caravan is hoping they get to grow their escort party over time, as when they're freshly starting up, they are only 30 members strong. Over time, they can grow up to 90. And finally, you need to hope they don't run into the middle of a kingdom with whom you're at war with.

I'll repeat this here : if you're at peace/haven't joined a kingdom yet, caravans are 100% the way to go. They will kickstart your run economically speaking like no other options could.

Yes and no. I'd say you want at least 1 healer 1 scout in your party. Then at least 2 other units to create their own parties so you can have close to 200 units in your army. Then you can if you're lucky take a castle or town. 1 or 2 caravans running around with workshops going is more than enough imo.

[ghyslain]

Originally posted by Ri0Rdian:

Does it depend on where you base the caravan at or will they move all over the place anyway, so you might as well use the closest city?

And how often do you see them get destroyed? (I have seen a perk about insurance for them but I both guess it does not work and 5k is just 30% so...)

I sometimes got quite unlucky and had caravans getting raided over and over during war time. Like if I wanted to keep my 4 caravans running, I was basically constantly running around to meetup with my companion and get their caravans restarted.

They will move all over the place indeed, with no consideration regarding kingdoms you're at war with. They obviously won't be able to access cities with whom you're at war with, but they will path right through a warzone with no qualms at all.

Basically, what this boils down to, is caravans should be a priority in your early game, but become a reduced priority once you become a mercenary/vassal since the investment is a much higher risk of becoming a liability at this point. Like even if your caravans nets you a solid 1k/day (which is definitely in the upper range of what you can expect), you'd need your caravan to run 15 days to break even on its recruitment cost.

Hope that helps.

[ghyslain]

Originally posted by Scottx125:

Originally posted by ghyslain:

It won't matter much regarding how good the companion leading the caravan, due to the sheer amount of units involved on both side of an auto-resolve combat he might face. It will help a bit, but think about it this way : if you get the best possible warrior with say 200 skills in melee stuff vs an average guy at 100 skills in melee, your elite warrior companion is basically worth 2 regular caravan troops in terms of fighting skills. What really ends up improving the odds of survival of a caravan is hoping they get to grow their escort party over time, as when they're freshly starting up, they are only 30 members strong. Over time, they can grow up to 90. And finally, you need to hope they don't run into the middle of a kingdom with whom you're at war with.

I'll repeat this here : if you're at peace/haven't joined a kingdom yet, caravans are 100% the way to go. They will kickstart your run economically speaking like no other options could.

Yes and no. I'd say you want at least 1 healer 1 scout in your party. Then at least 2 other units to create their own parties so you can have close to 200 units in your army. Then you can if you're lucky take a castle or town. 1 or 2 caravans running around with workshops going is more than enough imo.

Agreed that getting additional parties to form armies is great, but that isn't an option until you're in a kingdom. Also, I'd rather have an additional caravan/party than having a dedicated healer/scout in my party, until I'm literally swimming in gold and that gold becomes irrelevant. In the early/mid-game, gold can seriously hinders your progress and caravans are the best way to solve that issue.

I'll repeat again, once you start swimming in gold, then yea prioritizing dedicated scout/healer for your party is to be valued over additional caravans (since what difference does it make to have 1M stashed up vs 2M stashed up).

My 2 cents.

[Balan214]

ive topped out at 1200 one day down to 63 the next day. ive been in negatives also

[Baronsworth]

I want to start a caravan empire, but if they're so dumb that they go straight through warzones then that will be a problem (My faction is at war with everyone)

[ghyslain]

Originally posted by Baronsworth:

I want to start a caravan empire, but if they're so dumb that they go straight through warzones then that will be a problem (My faction is at war with everyone)

Sadly they will go through war zones with no qualms whatsoever. You could always try to roleplay and say have only 1 caravan active and escort it wherever it goes. But other than that, there's not much you can do beside praying that if they do run into hostile territory, that they can outrun whoever's chasing them.

[Balan214]

Originally posted by Baronsworth:

I want to start a caravan empire, but if they're so dumb that they go straight through warzones then that will be a problem (My faction is at war with everyone)

probably doing workshops instead of caravans would be the better bet

[Baronsworth]

Originally posted by Balan214:

Originally posted by Baronsworth:

I want to start a caravan empire, but if they're so dumb that they go straight through warzones then that will be a problem (My faction is at war with everyone)

probably doing workshops instead of caravans would be the better bet

You have a workshop limit, sadly

[Balan214]

Originally posted by Baronsworth:

Originally posted by Balan214:

probably doing workshops instead of caravans would be the better bet

You have a workshop limit, sadly

whats the limit per clan level? i decided to join my native khuzaits and now we are at war with northern and sturgian. i lost both my caravans dam near instantly and they were both fairly new. so i said screw this 15k down the drain no thanks