I've looked up all the available online tips for this game (there aren't many) and I'm finding the economy management on Normal difficulty to be absolutely brutal.

Typically I'll go for 2 trees and 2 iron ore income ASAP so that I have a constant source of lumber and iron for L1 tile improvements. Meanwhile I try and get the research for L2 gathering for wool, iron and wood as fast as I can if my local resources are limited (plus L2 roads, obviously).

I tend not to focus on the New World aside from maybe taking 1 nice province early because I find otherwise it's a distraction from the core resources.

Anyway by 1650 or so I usually have 6 iron ore, 6 wood a turn and a population of about 20. Then I go to invade some "small nation" next to me and find they inexplicably have top-of-the-line military troops in huge numbers while I have halberdiers and light cannons if I'm lucky.

While I've blockaded major powers like Spain for ages and sunk huge numbers of ships, they seem to still have a thriving economy and have so many troops that they have a big garrison in every single town. I've seen 12 of my units (Lancers, Halbardiers, Arquebusier and General, Culverin or Light Cannon) attack a Level 1 fort with literally 2 Bowmen in it and lose 3 times in a row. Whaaaaat?

I think the real problem is my economy. No matter how I try to rush tech or build improvements as fast as possible, I just don't seem to have the raw materials to compete with the AI. I can't work out if it's upgrading it's labour with New World commodities or what but I don't understand how it has the 50+ population needed to build such massive armies.

Any help appreciated ;)

It's a while i played it but what i remember...


Wool->fabric->more workers

grain->labor pool

Get Town Development as fast as possible.

Spys are very important to keep up with the other major powers

Knights are the best Unit early on and stay usefull during midgame


Conquering Indian Capitals can bring you a small fortune

Yep, Towns and Spies are big. One makes money and one keeps up the tech development with less money.

In the manual combat? You should be able to make hole in the wall with a cannon (close to the edge of map so the fort cannon will be to far to shoot at you) and then just enter with your melee units.

After posting about imperialism 2 it feeled like a good idea to play a Imperialism 2 match again
and as a aftermath i had some thoughts...

I.Settings
On higher Settings(above normal) or customized in that way other MP get several bonuses, including starttechs and additional development around their capital...if you play for fun...don't play above normal if you're not able to win at normal difficulty most the time.

On higher Settings neutral countrys are stronger and better defended, this is good if you plan to make some of them vassals

II.Turn I
First you look at the neutral countrys, they sell the ress(expect food) from their developed tiles at the free market, look for wool, thin, ore and wood...look at their strategic position too (do you share a border, do they share a border with a MP esp. a military aggressive like spain. Then choose one or two as trading partner, build a trade consulat there asap, at turn two build a ambassy and set subsidies. Early on MP normally don't sell Lumber/iron/Fabric or the materials to build them. Getting 2+ of these important ress from neutral countrys can speed up the development quite a bit and you might be even able to make these countrys you're vasall.

Send one of your ships to scout for the new world, the other two use for trading.

Your first economic goals should be 2 wood, 2 ore, two wool and more food
Set research but don't rush them, early on ressources&development are more a problem then research.
Printing Press, galleon, L2-roads, L2 gathering, Town Growth, Light arty/heavy arty, Heavy Inf. are good early goals+Heavy Cav. if ou have horses.

Build a 2. Explorer and a 2. Builder

New World
The only reason not to invest at the new World as early&fast as you can is a early War against a other MP, don't wage war against neutral countrys expect you're forced too. Fighting a MP makes them weaker and you might be able to conquer areas that are allready developed. Aside from this...if you're early strikes are successful it triggers often a chainreaction as the other MP attack the weakend one.

If you find Gems/Gold/...=direct income=steady research+buying more stuff from the market=faster development
sugar/tobacco/fur allow you to upgrade your working power without need for more food...even more with town
development.

Edit:
Just as a example, the province i conquered the last match was a capital with 2XSugar T1 next to the capital and 3 wood in the province. As a capital it had a harbor,was upgraded and the conquest gave my same money.
With the investment of 8Lumber&Iron i upgraded the sugar to t2=4 sugar and 1 refined sugar from the town, this alowed me to upgrade 3 workers to T2..raising the workpower from 3 to 12...and with a little investment it produced a lumber every turn too. Some good NW-provinces can be a real speed up.

Natives...peacefull trade or conquest
Until they get Horses&Guns the Tribes are easy prey and most MP will just take what they need. Expect for you being the country with the strongest military buying land will not save them and just bring trouble to you.
Soo..look for nice provinces and just conquer them, as a bonus tribal capitals allways have a harbor, several developed tiles and some cash.
Expand as far as you need, not as far as you can ;)

Military&Navy
First take into mind that upgrading cost nearly the same as building a new Unit and sometimes the improvment isn't worth the upgrade cost, compared to building a new Unit, esp. for ships.

For example...the last heavy merchant ship can
hold only 2 more cargo but is very expensive...expect for a situation where you're swimming in ress while close to the population cap it's better to build a new merchant and have 18 cargo instead of wasting all those ress for a 2 cargoupgrade.

Same for military Units, sometimes it's better to build additional Units instead of upgrading, expect for bowman&knights/Lancer you can allways upgrade them later if needed...upgrading 4 horsearty to light arty will give a
a bit better military rating and a moderat better combat performance, building 4 new light arty will give a nice boost for your military rating and nearly the same combat performance(depending at the experience the Units had.
Annd...Units are upgraded to the last version, using the ressprice-2 fabric, so upgrading a horsearty to a fieldarty isn't more expensive then upgrading a light arty

Overall Heavy Inf. and light Arty are the most usefull, starting with the T2 Units and staying usefull through the complete game. Bowmen and Lancercav. are usefull early on but don't stand a chance against the improved Units of the other unittrees. Light Inf. and Cav. are very strong if you use them right but thats a question of your playstyle..so testit out. The regular Inf. is, at least in my opinion, one of those allrounders that can't anthing right, they don't have to raw fighting power to break through with force and don't have enough mobility/rang to be played as a skirmisher.

My army is most a Heavy Inf. Core with light arty support and Heavy Cav. skrimishers.


Economy
T1 ressource Buildings cost 1 Lumber&Iron, T2 allready cost 4 Lumber&Iron=1 T2 Building or 1road+3T1 Building or 2 roads&2T1buildings so most the time it's better to build all Lev.I stuff first...
Towns that have the ress to benefit from Town groth are the expection, a upgraded town produces one Unit for 4 Ress of every possible combination...if a province has 2xIron Ore and 1 Coal...the town could produce 2 Iron+1Steel
if the ressourcebuildings are fully upgraded.

Soo...that are all common tipps that come to my mind, no game is the same for Imperialism 2...if you still have problems it's best to ask questions to special situations but keep into mind that playstyle has a huge impact at this game...i go for the new World most the time and i conquer the provinces i need but a friend of mine is aiming for military expansion at the Old world as fast as possible while the other MP weaken themselves with investments&conflict at the new world.

I try to get 6 explorers asap to explore the new world and find diamonds and gems. Then I take over those provinces. I rarely have to sell resources in IMP2

Edit : Nevermind.

There was an older thread here with lots of Imp2 strategies. Can't find it at the moment.

In general, my game hugely improved once I did the following:

- Nuts to the new world. It siphons off way too much effort for the crapshoot at finding gems & diamonds, which is the only thing that makes it worth the trouble. Let the AI worry about it. The only time I bother with the new world is later in the game when I can grab a diamond province from a weak or distracted AI.

- Nuts to worker upgrades. Again, too much effort for too little payoff. Maybe get a couple of level 2 workers if you get spare sugar, but otherwise no. This isn't Imp1. You can get by just fine with level 1 workers as long as you have enough grain. You're spending a LOT to upgrade workers when each level only gains you +1 net labor (after subtracting the 2 labor needed to produce their luxury good). It can be a disaster if you have a bunch of upgraded workers and a war blockades your income of luxury good materials and you watch your workers starve.

The only reason to bother with worker upgrade tech is it's necessary for the later military upgrades.

- DO NOT SPEND MONEY ON RESEARCH. This one is huge. Early on, buy a spy. Maybe 2. Spy on the AIs with the tech you want. Research those techs but set them to $0. You'll still research them at a decent pace, but at zero cost. Immediately replace eliminated spies. You'll be a tad behind the AI in tech, but it won't matter until wars happen. By then you should be making enough money to finally start spending money on research.

- If you can't get a source of tin from either your own lands or trading, you might as well start over.

- Town development is great. Remember you have to assign a worker to improve the town space. Towns & level 2 roads are the economic techs you want to reach ASAP.

- It is not worth it to improve any resource beyond level 2. Railroads are an expensive waste of time.

- Forts are a bargain.

- Immediately disband your starting bowman on turn 1. He is garbage and will be obsolete by the time you do any fighting. Much better to free up the food for workers.

- Prior to gunpowder infantry, it is not worth building any land unit other than horse artillery. After gunpowder infantry, it is not worth it to build anything else. Unless there are some crazy hidden stats I don't know about, there's little reason to build anything but heavy infantry. If you are absolutely swimming in steel later on, it might be worth it to build mobile artillery exclusively, but otherwise heavy infantry is the best balance between cost and population.

- Galleons are king. I usually don't bother with any military ships beforehand, and no other cargo ships once they're available. Galleons are the most important tech to rush along with horse artillery, town development, and level 2 roads. I usually don't even bother with ships of the line once they're unlocked.

- Invade minor nations for more grain as soon as you have enough of a military to take one of their capitals. Be careful it doesn't trigger a major power to annex it.

That's roughly it. Don't spend money on research and just use spies, don't bother with the new world except for later diamond grabs (send 1 ship to map it and give you vision only), stick with basic workers, rush towns and galleons and level 2 roads, stick to horse artillery and heavy gunpowder infantry. General rule of thumb is first player to research and deploy ironclads wins.

If your ally is declared war upon, you are expected to side with them and declare war on their enemies. You can refuse but if you do, your standing with all other nations will suffer.

So don't ally with weak nations that are likely to get picked on.

Alliances are only defensive so if your ally declares war on another major nation, you can refuse to join without penalties.

All right, thank you for your answer. I'll take your advice. :)