The "cities tech cost" and it's implications

AlazkanAssassin said:

However there is one point I would like clarified. Does the +5% compound with previous +5% increases or not?

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If I understand your question correctly (I'm not native English, in case you haven't noticed ), my guess is that answer is no, because that's how it works with culture and policies - that is, 5 % applies only to base cost, not to modified cost from previous cities. Thus, if native tech cost is 100 beakers, each city should increase cost linearly with 5 beakers, not exponentially.

The QC said:

Ok, I've made a relatively simple late game calculation.

Rocketry costs 6400 beakers in a void and it takes 8 turns to research at the time when MadDjinn is looking at it in his Beyond the Monument part 2 video.

A city adds 5%, which means 320 beakers that have to be re-earned by it in 8 turns. So, the city needs to provide 40 beakers per turn and, at this stage of the game, has no excuse to not have all science buildings. If I’m calculating correctly:

• A mountain-side city needs 6 population and all available science buildings to break even
• A non-mountain city needs 8 population and all available science buildings to break even

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Ok, that's useful to know. And kinda shocking, because getting to size 8 with all the science buildings takes forever in late game. Rushbuying all those buildings is a lot of cash as well.

And still, a tall Tradition empire will have much stronger core cities than a wide Liberty empire, so Liberty loses a lot of science right there as well, even if most cities break even.
Liberty has the benefit of more production which is useful for domination though.

FYI, in case it hasn't been mentioned, the % increase for both science and culture per city appears to scale based on map size. I had 3% science and 7% culture per city increases in my "large" map game.

Bridger said:

FYI, in case it hasn't been mentioned, the % increase for both science and culture per city appears to scale based on map size. I had 3% science and 7% culture per city increases in my "large" map game.

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Oh hey, I watched your game yesterday and I think you were surprised by how bad your science rate was, am I right? Late game was a massive crawl towards the next tech basically. xD

And you had what? 8 or 9 cities? You did settle your last 2-3 cities quite late but at very good spots. I think it severely hurt your science rate which is kinda sad.

Agree with this. Social policy cost increase is additive (e.g., for 6 cities the increase is 6 x 10%), not multiplicative. Haven't directly measured this yet (traveling - grrr), but I would be surprised if tech costs were different.

My take:


Honestly this is similar to how Civ IV did its economy. Every city you built cost more and more money, forcing you to either get more money or (more often) lower your science rate.

I am opposed to this idea less than i was the idea of culture penalties per city, mainly because new cities tend to naturally get science (through population and buildings that magnify the effect of that population), whereas culture mostly comes from static buildings or great artists (though in bnw maybe its different).

However, the big difference between this and CIV 4's system is that civ 4 gave me two ways to compensate for this. I could get more science with my new cities, or i could get more commerce and push my slider back up (effectively eliminating the penalty).

Civ 5 that penalty is always there with you, you can't get away from it.


But i will also say that Civ 5 has a different mindset than all the previous civs before it. Previous civs worked with the model that you should be expanding throughout the game. Now the pace might vary, but bottom line it was expand or die. Civ 5 was the first of teh games that said having 4 cities for the entire game is really okay, and actually competitive.

I personally have never liked that model, but i recognize it is a tenant of the game.

RealHuhn said:

Ok, that's useful to know. And kinda shocking, because getting to size 8 with all the science buildings takes forever in late game. Rushbuying all those buildings is a lot of cash as well.

And still, a tall Tradition empire will have much stronger core cities than a wide Liberty empire, so Liberty loses a lot of science right there as well, even if most cities break even.
Liberty has the benefit of more production which is useful for domination though.

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In my 1st game in BNW on king difficulty, I have not quite found that to be the case. Having gone Liberty->Commerce->Order, it was profitable to rex more cities in the late game, mostly because I had a cumulative ~60% (commerce, big ben, skyscapers) discount to rush buys. Given a food trade route, aqueduct and hospital, a city would be at least size 10 within 20 turns. In this example, I had about 12 cities on a standard sized map, am pulling ~700 research per turn and new techs take about 7 turns to earn in the mid-modern era.

Depending on if the 5% stacks linearly or exponentially, a new city going from 11->12 is either a 3% or 5% penalty to research.

Therefore, this new city would need to pull 35 beakers / turn to be a net positive effect (at 5%). That breaks even around size 10.

Might Order be the answer to this? It gives a beaker, factory bonus per city and the resettlement tenet which in essence is free pop thus free beakers.

Living in the UK I'm yet to have the pleasure of playing BNW - BUT it seems there are quite a lot of potentially handy new things for wide empires.

Faith generation can be pretty good if you go for piety and super-shrines. Combine that with the Jesuit Education reformation bonus (purchase tech buildings with faith) and you can quickly populate new cities with the necessary buildings. Does seem slightly odd to find a synergy there admittedly!

pilot00 said:

Might Order be the answer to this? It gives a beaker, factory bonus per city and the resettlement tenet which in essence is free pop thus free beakers.

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That is actually not very far from being true. If a new city has all Science Buildings AND Observatory AND Order bonus to factory it will need a population of 4,26 citizens to break even at a research rate of 8 turns. If you have the Order tennet that let's your city start at 4, that means you're almost even from start - you "just" need to rush-buy all the science buildings and the factory.

kaspergm said:

That is actually not very far from being true. If a new city has all Science Buildings AND Observatory AND Order bonus to factory it will need a population of 4,26 citizens to break even at a research rate of 8 turns. If you have the Order tennet that let's your city start at 4, that means you're almost even from start - you "just" need to rush-buy all the science buildings and the factory.

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Well with the + food from order, and the cheap factory,you can probably get a new city up very fast

(although it would be better if that Resettlement was still a little bit higher (say 5 or 6 starting pop)

kaspergm said:

I have a question: If you capture a city, your science cost will go up. What will happen if you raze the city - will the cost stay increase, similar to how it works with culture and policies, or will the penalty go away once the city is gone?

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I'd also like to know this. Additionally, if I sell a puppeted city to the AI, will that reduce the science hit or is it a permanent increase no matter what happens to the city in the future - razed, sold, or conquered?

RealHuhn said:

Oh hey, I watched your game yesterday and I think you were surprised by how bad your science rate was, am I right? Late game was a massive crawl towards the next tech basically. xD

And you had what? 8 or 9 cities? You did settle your last 2-3 cities quite late but at very good spots. I think it severely hurt your science rate which is kinda sad.

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I think that to remain competitive in science, one should send internal trade routes ASAP to cities founded later in the game because that 5% could be a huge increase like hundred beakers or something.

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Another factor for getting past breaking even is the ability to funnel food into the NC city, only needing a granary and trade unit. It sacrifices an international trade route for a relatively weaker city connection, but compensated by any salable luxes and strategics gained from expanding. Trading posts are noteworthy, especially with the policy to add a beaker.

Hamburger said:

I'd also like to know this. Additionally, if I sell a puppeted city to the AI, will that reduce the science hit or is it a permanent increase no matter what happens to the city in the future - razed, sold, or conquered?

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I just tested this and selling a city to the AI does lower future tech costs. I assume that razing cities and having them conquered works in the same way.

If it worked like policies and the increase was permanent then recovering from losing cities in a war would be even harder, both for players and the AI.