Now, if you're anything like me, the first thing you do is rush a theatre in there as soon as the city stops rioting.

That's right. The Evil Overlord, bent upon global conquest, kills thousands, or donates "millions" of gold, to erect a theatre.

Hopefully, they're at least putting on a musical about my life story... properly sanitized, of course. I'm really a Benevolent Dictator (the "best" kind of ruler) not an Evil Overlord. :lol:

And the second thing I do is construct a library... so my new subjects can read my autobiography... you know, it occurs to me that in order to criticize literature, you really need to suffer. Put that reviewer in the hot-box for a few weeks. Then he'll realize what a masterpiece my autobiography is!

It suddenly occured to me that I'm doing this wrong. If I have the gold (or population) to rush a building... shouldn't it be used on a building that'll be useful later... like a courthouse? I mean, where will you hold those mock trials before you execute those revolutionaries? That city is hemoraging gold, and I'm building theatres?

Rather than producing cultural buildings, I should be producing culture. You know, get the people out there to put up paintings to my magnificance, and put up those nifty statues of myself. No city is complete with me looking down upon the People... so that they'll know I'm watching them.

A city producing ten hammers per turn can produce five culture per turn if you've researched music. That's as good as a theatre and a library combined. Two turns later, the city will expand to the second level of culture, I can rush a courthouse, and then continue producing culture until my War Machine takes the next city...

Excellent idea! Another way is to just bring a missionary along...if it is your state religion, or if you're using free religion, you will get free culture once you have established the religion in the city :)

The theatre is still useful to keep the citizens happy. Unless you have wiped out the civ who formerly owned the city, they will "yearn for their motherland" and this causes happiness and growth issues.
The theatre enables the cultural slider to have an impact on happiness.

You're rigth about library though. It is a last resort cultural building. I use it only when the conquered city has very hard trouble getting back its surrounding lands and all other tactics and buildings have been used.

If the city you conquered is any good (like a capital), building a library will help tech. Free culture is just an added bounus.

Every enemy city looks better as a pile of rubble. Give the future archeologists something to explore.

Otherwise, good points. I'll have to give them a try.

But if you don't kill the original civ, the population in the city will be 90+% old civ, i think this balances with the 'mourn over the motherland' unhappinnes bonus, no ?

i kept track one time, i had whipped 192 of my own people, lost 2 pop to other civs and slaughtered on 85 pops from other civs before winning.

i'll save some spots for y'all in hell, we can have a pic nic

Ha! Sounds like that's one for the list

"I will erect a Theatre and Library in every city that I conquer, so that the ignorant masses may see and read the proper version of my life story"

.. anyway, I do the same thing. I like to build the Theatre at a minimum to push the borders out and help keep the city from flipping (which can be a big problem if you're not going to take the civ completely out, or there is a 3rd civ in the area with strong culture). Libraries help tech, if I have the cash I like to rush a University too.

After that it depends. A city that got bombed back to the ancient era will need to have tile improvements rebuilt ASAP, which means workers. A city that was taken more or less intact needs production or commerce/science improvements to quickly reach it's maximum productivity. A city that just lost 20 population points due to the effects of war will need a granery and some time to recover - like I said it all depends.

Rather than producing cultural buildings, I should be producing culture... A city producing ten hammers per turn can produce five culture per turn if you've researched music. That's as good as a theatre and a library combined. Two turns later, the city will expand to the second level of culture, I can rush a courthouse, and then continue producing culture until my War Machine takes the next city...

Duh! Why didn't I ever think about that? I've been doing exactly what you first mentioned -- rush buying theater then library -- to pump up the culture quickly. If I'm taking a lot of cities at once, I'll even adjust the culture slider to give them a boost after the theater is built. A lot of expense for little gain. So obvious, why didn't I think of it? :wallbash: Thanks for the tip, DarkFyre.

yeah you're right darkfyre.
How stupid of me (always built a theater first)

I'm now trying for my first ever conquest win.:hammer: However this is being treathened by the fact that I might get a domination victory first. I stopped keeping conquered cities when I was at around 52%. So 12% left for border expansions. I built the theater in those cities to get my people to work. Most cities were 10+, so I needed the land. However, a couple of turns down the road, these cities expand, and are about to expand again. I'm now at 60% with the FDR still left in the game. If I could only destroy those theaters now. Maybe before starting the war I'll give some of these cities to FDR, just to be able to burn them. Drastic times require drastic measures. :groucho:

Next time I will built the required culture and then stop.

My usual strategy for captured cities is to -

Have Caste System
When I capture the city, set 3 (on normal speed) artists. On the turn it comes out of anarcy the borders grow.
Build Ganery, so it can grow to decent size
Build courthouse, so it does not cost me too much.
Build whatever I would build in my own city of this specialty (library or bank if commerce, forge if production).

Sometimes I many build the courthouse first then granery.

Put me in the Theatre fist camp. Usually though I fight my wars early and often through Ancient/Renaissance and I'm in slavery...so a little :whipped: gets the theater out quickly & takes care of all those unhappy people.

Not the most efficient way to get a city up and running, I know, but it gets them unhappy quickly so I don't have to worry about them.

Theater is only necessary if there's cultural pressure on the city. If your attack is still advancing, you may end up eliminating the source of that pressure anyway.

My general strategy is to expand the cultural borders of a freshly captured city as quickly as possible. And generally by building theaters or libraries. Thank you all for the fresh options; I especially like the 'build culture' one. Second best is sending the missionary - especially if you also own the holy city: it gains you one extra gold, and if it is your state religion the culture flip might speed up as well.
You're not always playing caste system (It's not always the best option, this civics category is one I tend to change quite often), but when using it, it would be stupid not to use the artists.

Why didn't I see this before?

Once I was asked by Monty to kill of the Germans because his army couldn't finish the job, I captured all the German cities, and they flipped to Monty one by one because his major cities were on the border (overcrowded map). That hurts, getting beaten culturally by Monty:mad: