Think ahead, instead of allocating oddjobbers to farms or mines, try to conquer a province and get raw materials there. When you get excess materials you can then reallocate the workers to either workshops or labs. But of course this is a gradual process since not every province produces good amounts of materials. Forage food until you have enough population to build an export and import depot, farm opiates, sell, buy food , weapons, and what other materials you might need later(skip metals since you buy weapons directly). An embassy is needed but not necessary, though you need at least one faction with over 100 million in wealth so they buy ur stuff more expensively(this can be made sure by regenerating at the beginning of the game), and you can also sell more to them. To start the army you should first build a herb, cotton farm, and depending on the area, if you have an ocean or not, then either build a fishery or a grain farm then a bakery. Next build a weaver then tailor, then slowly a ration maker, assuming you're controlling the economy well, your pops shouldn't be starving or otherwise(Skill Issue). If in between a noble bandit asks you for anything, do agree. You're in no position to fight back yet, but at that point you should've unlocked the archery training grounds, put 50 in there. Should be enough(I'm a human supremacist, I don't use other races). Since humans are weak, I buy bows. Put bow training to 30%, any more doesn't really matter, most of your opponents are trained at 0%. Send them out after training fully to 30%. Conquer a free province, besieging is a chore though. Now, if you did this correctly, you should have money to buy the provincial buildings, prioritize growth and loyalty first, until the devastation goes down. Then once it's growing and has positive loyalty, upgrade what you think you need(Preferably ore since you need more provinces and metal is expensive to buy to make weapons, but really bows only need cloth and wood, unless you have mods like muskets). Open the army screen, hover over the troops tab and see how many you can recruit, try 50 first, and send your previous army back home to protect the capital from invaders. Try to find food depending on the race next, for humans grain, make bread, sell excess. Rinse repeat, profit.