Puppet City penalties?

[StormEye]

What are the penalties for having a puppet city versus annexing / razing and resettling?

I think they produce 'slightly' more unhappiness per population, and the fact that you cannot control the production, but when I am just trying to use extra population (for research) + culture points, are there any other penalties?

From what I know so far
+ No culture penalty for extra city
+ Provides research points
+ Provides culture
+ Provides gold (if outweighing maintenance)
- Slightly higher unhappiness per population (not sure how much, can someone tell me the exact number?)
- Cannot choose production
- Maintenance cost increase

Looking at the list I put up there, it just does not seem to be a bad idea to have some of decent puppet city, and speed ahead through research + culture + small gold influx (if efficient).

I have read a lot of posts that suggest its better to raze and build your own city, but wouldn't that cause massive culture penalties? Its not that I usually shoot for social policies for culture victory, but they do help for regular gameplay, which involves more often than not some wars and wonder competing(which I would like to be ahead of the other civs).

So can someone give me some explanation of how I should be choosing Annex / Puppet / Raze?

Thanks in advance.

[GamerKG]

Occupy (before you build a courthouse) is the most unhappiness. Once you build the courthouse (annex it) it is a normal city for all purposes. An occupied city is a normal city that costs more happiness (and that's the only difference).

A puppeted city:
-does not increase social policy cost
-always has gold focus (meaning the governor AI will value 1 gold over 1 of anything else)
-produces gold > culture > defense > happiness buildings. At least as far as I'm aware.

Same happiness as normal.

[StormEye]

So technically, there is no real penalty in puppeting a city?

[GamerKG]

Originally Posted by StormEye

So technically, there is no real penalty in puppeting a city?

In that it is costing normal happiness, yes. And that the AI probably didn't pick the ideal location. And you can't choose what it builds, or which tiles it works (it might keep growing, costing you more happiness that should be used on better cities/tiles). But otherwise, no.

[StormEye]

Then is it usually just better option to raze the city and build your own most of the time? (apart from those cities that have wonders that I would like to keep)

Would it not hurt social policy adoption greatly if I keep building my own cities, instead of puppeting it? Or is it just that culture penalty for extra city is not as big of an impact as I am imagining it to be?

[The_Quasar]

There are a number of things to think about before annexing/puppetting/razing...

Is the city likely to grow and become reasonably powerful (annex)
Is the city useless, and would become a liability (raze)
Has the city potential to become a goldmine, with lots of Trading Posts, which you will have to build (puppet)

Those are the basics, but it's the borderline cities which set the experienced player apart... the only way to tell that is to play lots of games, make some mistakes, and learn!

Beware, too, of razing a city with assets (like luxuries or good resources), as another civ is likely to have a Settler there quickly! If you want to put a settler there for some reason, have it ready.

One final point, wait until a city comes out of Occupation, before you annex it (you'll save a Happiness hit); and, if you can, buy a Courthouse immediately, if you do...

[StormEye]

How about the culture penalty for annex / resettling?

Is it a hindrance in most cases? Or do most cities pay off eventually with enough culture buildings?

As I have mentioned before, my usual goal is to be scientifically ahead of other civs to have higher tech military, with good production to back it up, and without having to sacrifice social policy adoption too much. So its still hard for me to decide how I want to treat conquered cities.

[Alpedar]

Depends on map size (on larger maps per city penalty is smaller (IIRC) and if you went liberty (smaller culture cost increase per city) and how many cities you already have and whether you are getting culture from things that scale with number of cities (buildings and specialists and some religious/cultural bonuses) or from unscalable ones.

In general, if I'm happy with gold from it and don't have problems with hapyness, puppet.
Otherwise wait out occupation timer and then maybe wait for next social policy and then annex it.

[The_Quasar]

Originally Posted by StormEye

How about the culture penalty for annex / resettling?

Is it a hindrance in most cases? Or do most cities pay off eventually with enough culture buildings?

As I have mentioned before, my usual goal is to be scientifically ahead of other civs to have higher tech military, with good production to back it up, and without having to sacrifice social policy adoption too much. So its still hard for me to decide how I want to treat conquered cities.

If you're going for culture, your parameters for annexing will change, and you will tend to puppet more... However, a city can be worth annexing, even when you're going for culture, just don't annex too many! It does take some experience to analyse and make the right decisions.

[Sjarrel]

I also check if they have some really good tiles (like key/rare resources) that might fall within the the borders of another civ/cs if you raze a city.

[GamerKG]

You can never overcome the culture hit with culture buildings alone. Multipliers would be needed (perhaps religion or Moai or Landmarks or artists).

Remember the per city cost "increases" exponentially, while culture gained per city is pretty static. So if you want a culture victory ASAP, found as few cities as possible while still keeping up to your satisfaction in military and science.

If you are just talking about having 2 full trees by the end of the game (maybe 3) then you could afford to annex several cities and puppet any others (raze absolutely crap ones).

As someone else said, you just have to try it and make mistakes until you learn. Good luck!