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Next-turn-gold
This article is about the collectible resource. For the Mineral vein, see Gold Ore.

Gold is one of the three main resources in the game. Gold management is a strategic challenge in Master of Magic. Unit quantities of this resource are represented with the Icon Gold Gold icon.

Description[]

Gold is a precious metal that can be transformed into Mana Crystals through Alchemy. Alluring in appearance and immune to deterioration, gold serves as a very high-level standard of exchange on Arcanus and Myrror, with one or two coins representing the average monthly tax revenues of a thousand townsfolk. Sprinkling gold into a city's coffers will cause new armies and guildhalls to seemingly pop up overnight. Presumably, common folk use lesser metal coin denominations to cover their own needs.

Icon  
Icon Gold 1 Gold
10Gold 10 Gold
GoldMissing 1 Gold deficit
10GoldMissing 10 Gold deficit

Overview[]

Gold is acquired mainly from Taxes, Alchemy, and Trade Goods; although Terrain and Minerals also play a part. So do Town Buildings, which can singificantly increase not only the taxable revenues of a Town's population, but also its income from other assets. Gold is also often found in Treasure, and there is even a Hero Ability that increases the amount gained each turn! In addition, Gold is rewarded for conquering Towns (whether neutral or owned by rival Wizards), and can sometimes be acquired through Diplomacy.

Gold is required for the upkeep of every Town Building except the Barracks; all Normal Units except Spearmen and Dwarf Swordsmen; and all Heroes except those that possess the Ability Noble Noble trait. Gold can also be used to "buy out" the Production of both buildings and units, in addition to allowing conversion directly into Icon Mana Mana Crystals. Occasionally, the player may also be offered Mercenaries or Heroes for hire, or a Magical Item for purchase from a wandering Merchant - these all require a reserve of Gold in the Wizard's treasury to acquire.

The game will instantly dismiss any units in excess of available funds, beginning with those further down in the map's unit database; i.e., newly-produced units will desert first. It will not scrap buildings; instead, the treasury will simply remain at Icon Gold 0.

The combined Upkeep Cost of the player's "mundane" armies, which is to say, those Normal Units which draw salaries in gold coins, is reduced by Icon Gold 1 per Icon Fame 1 Fame. Town Building maintenance is not reduced. Random petitioners cut their prices in half for Wizards with the Charismatic Retort.

Gold has a hardcoded limit of Icon Gold 30,000 and contributes nothing to the game's Score.

Tribute[]

The human player can tribute Gold to AI Wizards to improve relations. Four gold tribute options are presented, which represent 25, 50, 75, and 100% of the amount of gold the opponent already has in his treasury, rounded down to the nearest 25, but a minimum of 25, 50, 75 or 100 gold even if the wizard has less than that amount. For a Gold tribute, Visible Relations improve by:

Random(1-3) * Chosen Menu Item * (4 * Chosen Menu Item) / 10

...where Chosen Menu Item is the gold entry selected, from 1 to 4. Offering gold has no effect on the Peace Interest and Hidden Relation variables.

Strategy[]

Tax Rate[]

The Tax Rate should be the highest possible where Unrest in the dominant Race can be suppressed to non-existence, or close to it. Rebels consume Icon FoodFood and produce neither Icon Production Hammers nor revenue themselves. Meanwhile, hammers are expensive to buy, losing hammers-per-turn can cause nuisances like lost turns and wasteful overflow, and "surplus farming" always needs to be allotted for the army's maintenance. Considering all of these complications, the optimal tax rate is hardly ever at the point of highest gold earnings.

Mixed-race empires have tensions that increase unrest and lower the optimal tax rate. To push taxes up, quell unrest with:

Rushing Construction[]

Rushing construction of units and buildings is the most important use for gold. Turns saved by bumping little goals forward will create a snowballing growth effect. It's especially important to rush projects intelligently on the higher Difficulty settings, to overcome the huge advantages given to the AI players and pull ahead of them in development.

It is possible to buy more stuff over time by micromanaging the Town Screen in Master of Magic with "incremental buying." Bear each of these matters in mind:

  • With no production progress, buying a building or unit costs Icon Gold 4 per Icon Production 1 remaining.
  • With more than zero and less than one-third progress, it costs Icon Gold 3 per Icon Production 1.
  • With at least one-third progress, it costs Icon Gold 2 per Icon Production 1.
  • It is possible to switch to a different project after buying one.

As an example, buying a Miners' Guild outright with no time invested requires four times its production cost, or Icon Gold 1,200. Consider the following procedure:

  1. Buy Spearmen (Icon Production 10 for Icon Gold 40)
  2. Swap-and-buy Swordsmen (Icon Production 10 for Icon Gold 20)
  3. Swap-and-buy Settlers (Icon Production 40 for Icon Gold 80)
  4. Swap-and-buy City Walls (Icon Production 90 for Icon Gold 180)
  5. Swap-and-buy Miners Guild (Icon Production 150 for Icon Gold 300), for a total savings of Icon Gold 580

This technique becomes torturous if used all the time, and for the sake of not getting mired in the City Screens, there are two main occasions for thinking about micromanagement. The first is in beelining your first real army. For instance if playing as the Trolls, it will pay off massively to rush a Fighters' Guild and a couple of War Trolls and go on a rampage through the world's cities and lairs. The other occasion is in growing new settlements. Investing towards the Farmers' Market and its prerequisites (and optionally a Sawmill and Shrine) will save many, many turns in growing that settlement into a useful city.

Alchemy[]

Rolling tax revenues over into Icon Mana Mana is useful for the Wizard's development. The more taxes can cover the cost of spellcasting, the more Icon Power Power can be allocated to researching new spells and improving spell casting skill. The Retort of Alchemy brings this strategy into focus. On the other hand, the retort of Mana Focusing, while less popular by far, can help the Wizard keep his economy separate from his spellcraft and concentrate on rapid secular growth. The two retorts can even function together as a rushing tactic.

Stashing Gold[]

The only time not to buy buildings is to keep enough gold on-hand to attract random petitioners (Heroes, Mercenaries, and Merchants). This pays off better if there are no heroes in your employ, maximizing the chance of one calling. Late in the campaign when Icon Fame Fame is extremely high, it may pay off again in the form of Merchants hawking otherwise-unobtainable Magical Items. This requires holding three times the price of such items in the treasury.

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