Are there disadvantages with with having fewer cities at all?

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hardcore_gamer

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Oct 25, 2009
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They get more culture, don't suffer from any real research penalty and its much easier to manage a few large cities then it is to manage a dozen smaller cities.

The reason I ask is because of a hotseat game I am playing with a friend of mine.

He has lots of cities but I only have 4. And yet in spite of this, I have a higher overall population, almost double the research (though I admit this is influenced by the fact that I have researched about half of the Rationalism tree and all 4 of my cities are currently producing research), WAY higher culture and tourism, have much higher happiness (though this is largely because he is suffering from nasty ideas penalty while I don't), and can easily afford to maintain an army more powerful then him. In addition, I have way more wonders then him because the fact that each of my cities is much larger means I can build them faster.

So, is there any real point in not keeping your empire limited to just a few cities?

The game feels a bit unbalanced right now when it comes to the "tall VS wide empires" thingy.

Thoughts?

EDIT: Also, do you suffer from a research penalty by adding puppets into your empire?
 
hardcore_gamer said:
They get more culture, don't suffer from any real research penalty and its much easier to manage a few large cities then it is to manage a dozen smaller cities.

The reason I ask is because of a hotseat game I am playing with a friend of mine.

He has lots of cities but I only have 4. And yet in spite of this, I have a higher overall population, almost double the research (though I admit this is influenced by the fact that I have researched about half of the Rationalism tree and all 4 of my cities are currently producing research), WAY higher culture and tourism, have much higher happiness (though this is largely because he is suffering from nasty ideas penalty while I don't), and can easily afford to maintain an army more powerful then him. In addition, I have way more wonders then him because the fact that each of my cities is much larger means I can build them faster.

So, is there any real point in not keeping your empire limited to just a few cities?

The game feels a bit unbalanced right now when it comes to the "tall VS wide empires" thingy.

Thoughts?

EDIT: Also, do you suffer from a research penalty by adding puppets into your empire?
Click to expand...

The research penalty applies to any additional cities you own, regardless if they are annexed or puppets. Note that it is also scaled based on the map (5% for Standard size, 3% for Huge).

I always build just a few cities (4 to 6). I never seem to get all the high numbers like the Civ veterans do which is frustrating, but whenever I go wide, I can never keep up my military. The main disadvantages I could see of having just a few cities is that, if you aren't allied with city states and have no power in the World Congress, you may be confined as a regional rather than global power. Without lots of territory you could lack the situational power needed to throw your armies around the world. Also, if you only have a few cities, it might be easier to be wiped out by a runaway or general warmonger civ like the Zulu or Carthage in my experience.
 
Disadvantages for going tall? Not really. Advantages for going wide? Quite possibly.

The point is that going tall is reliable and safe. It almost always works, and it's easier to get a handle on. Going wide is definitely more risky, but with the risk comes a bigger payoff: if you can manage to avoid unhappiness and defend yourself while your cities start to come online, you'll end in much better shape than a tall player. Wide produces more gold (city connections), and once your cities get rolling, it eventually outpaces tall in science, production, faith, and sometimes culture/tourism, too.
 
aaaactualy they dont get more culture. in fact going wide and building alot of culture producing buildings will net u alot more culture, its just that the policy's will cost more ( get liberty policy to reduce this policy cost of settling more citys).
so im thinking that a wide empire with alot of this will have a larger cultural defence.

also larger empires will have more roads giving more gold from said roads. Another bonus from large empires is the ability to produce more military units while still being able to build important buildings in capital. fewer citys will have a harder time warmongering

also some civs just do better from going wide. eg. Mayans with there shrines, Arabia and Celts ( faith from the base city's next to Forrest will be quite noticeable)

large 20+ citys can be quite amazing, i think they both have there place
 
iconocast said:
aaaactualy they dont get more culture. in fact going wide and building alot of culture producing buildings will net u alot more culture, its just that the policy's will cost more ( get liberty policy to reduce this policy cost of settling more citys).
so im thinking that a wide empire with alot of this will have a larger cultural defence.

also larger empires will have more roads giving more gold from said roads. Another bonus from large empires is the ability to produce more military units while still being able to build important buildings in capital. fewer citys will have a harder time warmongering

also some civs just do better from going wide. eg. Mayans with there shrines, Arabia and Celts ( faith from the base city's next to Forrest will be quite noticeable)

large 20+ citys can be quite amazing, i think they both have there place
Click to expand...

But now with BNW, it seems that the research penalty is a greater punishment than the social policy penalty in preventing players from going wide. That 5% seems to have a huge effect starting particularly in the modern era. Research seems to be really sluggish.
 
the disadvantage is you have less cities. Less land. Less archeological digs. You should have less gold if the large empire builds the right buildings. More cities means harder to be taken. Less musuems to hold your great works. Large empires can have specialists in every city for extra gp generation. Less total production, a small empire (shouldn't) be able to pump out as many units as a large one. Less luxury and strategic resources. Their are more, just can't think of any off the top of my head.
 
MadHaxxor said:
the disadvantage is you have less cities. Less land. Less archeological digs. You should have less gold if the large empire builds the right buildings. More cities means harder to be taken. Less musuems to hold your great works. Large empires can have specialists in every city for extra gp generation. Less total production, a small empire (shouldn't) be able to pump out as many units as a large one. Less luxury and strategic resources. Their are more, just can't think of any off the top of my head.
Click to expand...

These are actually all good points. However, there are usually some digs in city-state or unclaimed territories so you may be fine there. Also, if you can get Uffizi and Broadway, you might be able to get some additional slots, but still not as many as a wide empire. All around these points seem to hold true.
 
As others have said you'll basically want somewhere from 3-7 cities in almost every game (unless you're ICS'ing). Rationalism generally meshes much better with tall strategies. This, combined with the scaling tech costs, make going tall far superior for gaining the tech lead. If wide strategies have one glimmer of hope it's that domestic trade routes allow you to grow new cities much faster than before, and also that order is a lot more accessible. Even so I think a peaceful "wide" empire won't have more than 7 cities for most games.

I think the real stumbling block for wide empires is happiness, as 4 unhappiness per city is quite brutal. Even if you hook up a luxury you still have to make up for the unhappiness from the 1 population. IMO unhappiness from cities should be reduced to 3.
 
WC4J said:
But now with BNW, it seems that the research penalty is a greater punishment than the social policy penalty in preventing players from going wide. That 5% seems to have a huge effect starting particularly in the modern era. Research seems to be really sluggish.
Click to expand...

true, i think this was done to counter ics? not sure but if u get some libraries and a decent population in each city it should still produce alot of science. i havent realy played wide enough yet to form a opinion on this.
 
On a standard size map there are never room for more than 2-4 cities. Not in my BNW experience anyway.
 
The disadvantage? You can't direct as many food routes to your capital, making it weaker and smaller.

Wide players have in fact much more opportunities to become taller, especially Venice. 10+ food routes to capital (esp if most naval) will make Venice giant. 60+ pop Venice around 1750-1800? Doable if you... obtained some cities from your enemies and sent the food, especially if those cities were coastal.
 
Less strategic Resources. I fist founded 5 cities in my last game, then founded another one when coal was revealed and yet another when oil was revealed. I Conqured a handful cities and kept 2 Capitals (sold . So I ended up with 9 Cities. If I would have hept only the original five, I would have had neither coal, nor oil.
 
Playing on King first time, as Wu Zetian, 8 cities and no wars. Yet I have constant happiness
problems and little gold, leading in science. Maybe going liberty was a mistake as I am not expanding. Usually I DOW at some point and win by this on Prince. Here I am with fewer cities, playing peacefully and in 1978 -8 unhappiness even with Eiffel Tower. I have no idea why this unhappiness is arising despite the tooltip.
 
One important thing is the World Games, ISS, World Fair factor. If you throw 10 cities at World Games production for 4-5 turns, you are almost guaranteed to beat the little 4 city civ that is going tall.
 
pwnerer said:
One important thing is the World Games, ISS, World Fair factor. If you throw 10 cities at World Games production for 4-5 turns, you are almost guaranteed to beat the little 4 city civ that is going tall.
Click to expand...

Exactly. Throw all 10 of those cities at the project, and you can often stop before it's done because you've literally built more than half of it. And the bonuses from winning those projects are HUGE.
 
That 5% science penalty is, iirc, additive.

10 extra cities mean that you have to produce 50% more beakers to get the same tech. This is, of course, doable assuming that the average science output of cities 2-10 is more than 5% of the capital's.
 
Looking at how part of culture moved to a limited number of artist specialists, and science now has a per city penalty I think part of the focus of BNW was to make building tall as good as building wall.

ICS used to be hands down better then building tall now I feel like they are more balanced against each other. The science penalty doesn't seem to be "of the current base" like the culture one so you can easily overcome it by having your settlements developed enough to produce their own science, but a bunch of 2 pop cities on every square even the ice on the polls will destroy you. I like this.
 
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