How do I do a wide empire?

[Minor Annoyance]

I always seem to screw this up by not going all the way with it. In my first attempt I was Arabia and I don't remember how it went but I do know it wasn't good. Second was France which went better because I wasn't always seeing policies culture getting further and further away so there wasn't so much hesitation to expand. But I remember always having money trouble despite lots of trading posts and not being able to produce anything, and I had no iron so I no prospects for wars for a long time. I don't remember how it ended but it probably wasn't good.

Those were both played before they increased the minimum city distance so I was able to have just two hexes between them. I assume it was the cost/benefit of trade routes that it was changed to deal with but it that is what it changed to fix I'd prefer they'd done it differently because having cities that close simplified decisions. Also I wonder if now that trading posts are so much later if it's necessary to keep cities with three tiles between them if there's less money available early on.

My most recent game I was China to use Paper Makers for the extra gold per city. First mistake was playing on a Great Plains map. It's smaller than other maps, which put me in conflict faster. I got used to building units early in civ4 but I still don't get the timing right in this. I kept putting off expanding because I was always so close to a national wonder which would be difficult to build later, or a new policy. I wanted to get all the ones in liberty and honor that would increase culture. So I fought back Austria and later took there capital. I actually wiped them out but 30 turns later the whole world came to kill me so I went back and left them a city so we all stayed friends. Eventually I had four my own cities and Austria's capital, then I had to take out Siam and took four cities. Now I have more units than anyone so the game's won. Money was plentiful too so that did work this time. I went up to King because I heard going for a conquest win is easier than others, and it looks like it was.

So what exactly is the right way to do a wide empire? I know mostly trading posts and keep population at the cities local happiness limit, but doing that this time I had tones of extra happiness from not expanding because I was always just about to get something else that expanding would ruin. I need to know what to ignore in favor of what else so I can just commit to screwing culture or whatever else to go all in on having lots of cities.

[Esperr]

The easiest way to go wide is to start tall with the good ol three to five, taking the happiness when garrisoned from honor, and then conquering wide into puppets so you dont raise the culture threshold to the point of no return.

Most "wide" games ive had i have 4 to five actual cities and then end up with twenty or thirty more puppets by the time the games over.

[Syntax Error]

Yep, I need help with this as well. Assuming Standard Pace:

1.) How many cities should I have at turn 100?
2.) How far away from each city would give the best/optimum return in Trade Route income? I think the best would be four hexes away, so as to not encroach on each of your cities' territory too much.
3.) What to research? I have a habit of going straight for NC on any game I play.
4.) When to build settlers?
5.) Best build order (assume continents/pangaea. If you can share other map types that would be OSSUM!)?
6.) What to rushbuy and what to hard build.

Thanks!

[Ritzy Cat]

Originally Posted by Esperr

The easiest way to go wide is to start tall with the good ol three to five, taking the happiness when garrisoned from honor, and then conquering wide into puppets so you dont raise the culture threshold to the point of no return.

Most "wide" games ive had i have 4 to five actual cities and then end up with twenty or thirty more puppets by the time the games over.

You have no idea how much this happens to me. With wide empires I tend to develop the cities a lot more building wise, so by end-game I have nothing else to build but expand the army. So I have this massive army, I feel I might as well conquer my continent. Plus the puppeting doesn't do anything bad if you're going for science/cultural

[Danei]

I've found that non-puppet wide empires (that is, I'm founding most of the cities myself) have become a lot easier and less timing-specific since G+K, mostly due to mercantile city-states and religion-based happiness bonuses.

I don't have build orders or anything like that (because I'm not a good enough player to make them :P) but because happiness is one of the main obstacles to wide empires (the other being other civs getting mad on you for encroaching on "their" land), I just wait until I have a decent surplus of happiness, and then settle cities. I usually aim for around 10 happiness surplus per new city I want to settle.

Keep in mind, though, that I decide on wide/tall/hybrid based on the map, terrain, my civ's unique traits, and what types of city-states I run into/befriend. So if I thought I was going to have trouble with wide, I just wouldn't do it.

Also keep in mind that early in the game, wide empires often involve a lot of 'avoid growth' management. If a city's new citizen isn't going to be able to do something useful immediately, I avoid growth in that city and grow somewhere else where I'll be producing a better yield.

The question of where a new citizen will be MOST useful, short-term and long-term, is often very difficult, but there are also a lot of no-brainer cases where you know you DON'T want a new citizen (like, the only unworked terrain left is snow, or something). Better players than me, especially those who are willing and able to crunch numbers, can probably optimize growth much better than I can, but even with just guesstimating like I do, early wide empires became a lot more viable for me.

I play on Emperor, btw. I can't win harder games without ruthless and meticulous exploitation of combat AI deficiencies, and it's not very fun for me. :P

[Esperr]

Originally Posted by Syntax Error

Yep, I need help with this as well. Assuming Standard Pace:

1.) How many cities should I have at turn 100?
2.) How far away from each city would give the best/optimum return in Trade Route income? I think the best would be four hexes away, so as to not encroach on each of your cities' territory too much.
3.) What to research? I have a habit of going straight for NC on any game I play.
4.) When to build settlers?
5.) Best build order (assume continents/pangaea. If you can share other map types that would be OSSUM!)?
6.) What to rushbuy and what to hard build.

Thanks!

1)at least three, if you have a good enough start three to five, if your going library slingshot into notre dame then even two is fine as long as you get ND before turn 100, I cant remember what turn I ussually get it on.
2)tiles away doesnt matter, being good land is all that matters, sometimes you get forced to cram, and thats fine as long as you gain some good bloodland later.
3) if your aggro then obviously go mining->onward settle on iron swrods blah blah blah. If your going for boom then just do the standard library slingshot into notre dame, proceed to boom and win from there. remember, trade off resources and luxuries for lump sums to keep constant RA's with everybody you can going, also, sell open borders for fifty bucks a pop.
4)Idk, I just build them when I need them, IMO, 4-5 base cities is good, anything below or beyond that doesnt feel efficient.
5)Again totally strategy dependant, but monument should always be first or second just to blow through three or four policies early.
6) Again, I dont have some kind of set in stone plan for this, I generally chill on money, so if im booming and somebody DOW's me because I have next to no army, I can curb stomp them next turn with my magically appearing army. I generally tend to buy a library or colloseum in new cities depending on the situation, late game you buy a granary and hospital. Like I said, and I know you probably hate hearing this, but theres not really anything super set in stone.

[The Pilgrim]

Minor Annoyance, check out this thread. Not a self promoting act , but it just happened that I had a wide China game yesterday. It wasn't perfect strategy-wise, but it was wide.

Originally Posted by Syntax Error

Yep, I need help with this as well. Assuming Standard Pace:

1.) How many cities should I have at turn 100?
2.) How far away from each city would give the best/optimum return in Trade Route income? I think the best would be four hexes away, so as to not encroach on each of your cities' territory too much.
3.) What to research? I have a habit of going straight for NC on any game I play.
4.) When to build settlers?
5.) Best build order (assume continents/pangaea. If you can share other map types that would be OSSUM!)?
6.) What to rushbuy and what to hard build.

Thanks!

In the matter of fact, there are a lot (and I mean a lot) threads in this section about wide empires. You both should search for them, since many good tips were provided.

Generally speaking, you need to determine how many cities you have in you first wave (pre-NC) and how many later. National wonders is what dictates expansion pace for me. More than happiness or SP's, tbh. For the first wave I wouldn't settle more than four. First, the earlier you get NC up, the better. And second, slowing down SP acquisition without being able to back it up with cultural buildings/CS hurts. Although in some cases this can be a viable and intentional tactics.
Second wave is pre-Ironworks (more important, IMO, than Circus Maximus, but that's just me), which requires workshops in all cities. So they should be pretty high in priority list. You can rarely find more than 7-8 spots with good production.
Third wave is pre-Oxford. Universities are expensive hammer-wise, so if you have 15 cities of your own, you'll unlikely be able to hard build unies in all of them. On the other hand, with wide empire you generate enough cash to rush buy them in satellites that can't keep up. It's still unclear to me when Oxford should be built in G&K yet. But probably in the very end, so there is no hurry and that is not supposed to slow down the expansion.
Regarding best build order - there is no such thing. Each map is different. Capital usually starts with scouts, then monument, then settlers at size 3. Newly settled cities with monument and library (the order depends on their production capacity). If some cities are very unproductive, you need to rush buy a library there not to delay NC. Workers are usually also can be rush bought (I rush buy two in average).

Originally Posted by Esperr

1)at least three, if you have a good enough start three to five, if your going library slingshot into notre dame then even two is fine as long as you get ND before turn 100, I cant remember what turn I ussually get it on.

Assuming he asks about G&K (the OP does), ND is at the bottom of the tree now.

2)tiles away doesnt matter, being good land is all that matters, sometimes you get forced to cram, and thats fine as long as you gain some good bloodland later.

I disagree. 3-4 tiles away are ok, 5 is a stretch, 6 are real stretch, more than that = 2 cities. If you look for perfect spots for cities, you'll never have a wide empire. The whole point is to cover as much land as you can with as many cities as you can to maximize population (= science) and income.

3) if your aggro then obviously go mining->onward settle on iron swrods blah blah blah. If your going for boom then just do the standard library slingshot into notre dame, proceed to boom and win from there. remember, trade off resources and luxuries for lump sums to keep constant RA's with everybody you can going, also, sell open borders for fifty bucks a pop.

Again, in G&K defending with melee units doesn't seem very effective (would be great if someone can provide a proof of the opposite). Selling OB is not viable either. Comes in late and lets enemy missionaries spread their heresy without attrition.

4)Idk, I just build them when I need them, IMO, 4-5 base cities is good, anything below or beyond that doesnt feel efficient.

The thread is about wide empires. 4-5 is not wide.

Edit: The most important and the most obvious (so obvious we forget to mention it ) point is, don't go wide, if you land doesn't allow it. You need a good and spacious territory with natural defense (chokepoints, mountains, coasts, CS etc) and many luxuries. If you were spawned in the center of the map between Japan and Greece, just forget it. Do wide empire the other way by puppeting. That's actually easier both to accomplish and to manage.

[Minor Annoyance]

Originally Posted by The Pilgrim

Minor Annoyance, check out this thread. Not a self promoting act , but it just happened that I had a wide China game yesterday. It wasn't perfect strategy-wise, but it was wide.



In the matter of fact, there are a lot (and I mean a lot) threads in this section about wide empires. You both should search for them, since many good tips were provided.

Generally speaking, you need to determine how many cities you have in you first wave (pre-NC) and how many later. National wonders is what dictates expansion pace for me. More than happiness or SP's, tbh. For the first wave I wouldn't settle more than four. First, the earlier you get NC up, the better. And second, slowing down SP acquisition without being able to back it up with cultural buildings/CS hurts. Although in some cases this can be a viable and intentional tactics.
Second wave is pre-Ironworks (more important, IMO, than Circus Maximus, but that's just me), which requires workshops in all cities. So they should be pretty high in priority list. You can rarely find more than 7-8 spots with good production.
Third wave is pre-Oxford. Universities are expensive hammer-wise, so if you have 15 cities of your own, you'll unlikely be able to hard build unies in all of them. On the other hand, with wide empire you generate enough cash to rush buy them in satellites that can't keep up. It's still unclear to me when Oxford should be built in G&K yet. But probably in the very end, so there is no hurry and that is not supposed to slow down the expansion.
Regarding best build order - there is no such thing. Each map is different. Capital usually starts with scouts, then monument, then settlers at size 3. Newly settled cities with monument and library (the order depends on their production capacity). If some cities are very unproductive, you need to rush buy a library there not to delay NC. Workers are usually also can be rush bought (I rush buy two in average).


Assuming he asks about G&K (the OP does), ND is at the bottom of the tree now.


I disagree. 3-4 tiles away are ok, 5 is a stretch, 6 are real stretch, more than that = 2 cities. If you look for perfect spots for cities, you'll never have a wide empire. The whole point is to cover as much land as you can with as many cities as you can to maximize population (= science) and income.


Again, in G&K defending with melee units doesn't seem very effective (would be great if someone can provide a proof of the opposite). Selling OB is not viable either. Comes in late and lets enemy missionaries spread their heresy without attrition.


The thread is about wide empires. 4-5 is not wide.

Edit: The most important and the most obvious (so obvious we forget to mention it ) point is, don't go wide, if you land doesn't allow it. You need a good and spacious territory with natural defense (chokepoints, mountains, coasts, CS etc) and many luxuries. If you were spawned in the center of the map between Japan and Greece, just forget it. Do wide empire the other way by puppeting. That's actually easier both to accomplish and to manage.

OK. Good stuff. National college, ironworks, circus, I'll pause expansion to build and the rest I'll just get if possible. I'll pick a better map too. Last time I was getting 'don't build near us' after the second city. Too small.
I finished that last game. Strange that I won, because it was my first game on king, and I build only four of my own cities making much of the Liberty tree go to waste. Plenty of puppets though. I guess it's true that conquest games are easier if I can screw up by base strategy and still win. I wasn't the tech leader though so I didn't run away with the whole thing. I got some good use out of autocracy which I hadn't used before. I got looted culture from capturing a wonder rich city from the Inca who I think were trying for a culture victory. I probably should have fought more than one war at a time since I had like 20 units that never saw combat just walking behind others.

So I'm going to play Byzantium because I planned to play them first but got sidetracked. I think religion plays better with a wide empire anyway. You mostly need building for more faith so more cities makes that easier, plus pressure will spread the religion faster if they're close together. I'll pick some culture based beliefs to make up for the extra cities. I'll go with the large islands map scrips so I can use their unique ship unit. Although it's not one of the UU that have a promotion for there power so I'll have to get into a fight early to make use of it and the Cataphract.

Thanks