City advice

[stroypa]

Hi there, I've been playing ciV for a while now and whilst I'm nowhere near being a real noob I'm not exactly a veteran either. I seem to have 1 problem and that's not knowing a good number of cities to have or by what time.

I always go for NC start first, and then quickly expand to add 2-3 more cities within the next 30 turns or so (I play on standard pace and map size around prince/king). But then I generally just don't get round to adding anymore because I get too focused on improving my GPT and BPT, building wonders, happiness etc. I guess part of it is also because I don't have a clear idea in my head of when to be adding more and how many overall is good to place myself, or how many to get through puppeting. So because I am unsure I just avoid it.

I'm ok at war, but I don't seek out conquest victories very often, I generally go for space victory. So any tips for things like how many cities I should build and by what time, how many to conquer, and what is a good overall number to have. Also what's a good average size pop for my gold cities which I just use for trading post spam.

Thanks for any help or tips guys. Anything will be appreciated.

 

[CYZ]

I have the same preference. Get a few core cities early and then can't be bothered to invest in new ones (unless I find a really nice spot which is rare by then). Just seems wastefull to invest in it, possibly piss off AI and diminish my culture output.

I try different strategies though. OCC, massive conquest or REX. Still, those all feel unnatural to me.


I think they key is to do what feels best for you. Just try to find what you feel good with.

Tips I can give for going more wide is keeping an eye on happiness and growth. Ten happiness usually means you can afford to expand, but if you plan to grow your current cities more and don't have happiness coming perhaps not so much. Easiest way to expand is to not focus your city on food, build happy buildings and pay Citystates for luxuries.

 

[wcbarney]

... I seem to have 1 problem and that's not knowing a good number of cities to have or by what time. I always go for NC start first, and then quickly expand to add 2-3 more cities within the next 30 turns or so (I play on standard pace and map size around prince/king). But then I generally just don't get round to adding anymore because I get too focused on improving my GPT and BPT, building wonders, happiness etc. ...

I almost always stick with just 3, once in awhile 4, core cities. Any more than that you get overwhelmed with issues. I almost always go for a conquest victory, so I usually end up with a few dozen puppets, and I usually ally with every CS on the map. But for any kind of victory I would advise allying with all CS which can offer luxuries for as well as conquering a few cities & making them . Countering the issues will be even more demanding with the new June/July patch, so you will have to build all the buildings, and go for all the policies, and to make that easier you should ally with all the CS. Why puppets? They give you access to luxuries, strategic resources, LOTS of (because by default they are gold-focused),, and

 

[stroypa]

I think they key is to do what feels best for you. Just try to find what you feel good with.

Yeh good point, only problem is it usually ends with me getting dominated by some bigger civ that tries (and succeeds) to bully me.

One thing I don't do much is puppet, I'll try work on that a bit I think.

 

[CYZ]

Yeh good point, only problem is it usually ends with me getting dominated by some bigger civ that tries (and succeeds) to bully me.

One thing I don't do much is puppet, I'll try work on that a bit I think.

Try to find allies against such a bully. You wage war to destroy their army, pillage their resources and let another civ take over the useless cities. Perhaps puppet the capital as it usually has wonders and/or resources you don't have.

Then you can play the rest of the game on the defense. Don't get bullied, fight back.

 

[stroypa]

Try to find allies against such a bully. You wage war to destroy their army, pillage their resources and let another civ take over the useless cities. Perhaps puppet the capital as it usually has wonders and/or resources you don't have.

Then you can play the rest of the game on the defense. Don't get bullied, fight back.

I'll try, but they're so damn intimidating. Can't I just tell the teacher? My last game I was bullied by 3 people. Askia, monty and cathy all were really close to me and I was arabia. I tried to sell them my extra resources from the bazaar, but they figured out it would be cheaper if they all just gangbanged me, and so they raped those resources out of me.

But yeh I'll try and stop the problem before it gets too much to handle I guess. Sounds so easy but it's harder to put into practice.

 

[b.dorrell]

... quickly expand to add 2-3 more cities ... just don't get round to adding anymore ...
I generally go for space victory.

Thanks for any help or tips guys. Anything will be appreciated.

I would say that these two strategies are incompatable. For a space victory you need to outpace the AI on science. The more cites you have the more science you get, for a small number of cities space victory is probably the worst to go for, maybe try culture or diplo.

 

[FromBirth]

@stroypa, you mention you go for science victories so I assume you are keeping tech pace. The other civs are then perhaps bullying you because you are neglecting your army. press F9 and check how you stand on soldiers. try to keep near the top.
Once you have this army you may feel comfortable going for a few of their cities. In your case I would recommend puppeting so you can leave them to it and carry on with the three or so cities you have established. Some people advocate only puppeting capitals and razing/selling every other city due to happiness constraints. I however seem to be able to manage a few dozen like the previous poster without too much happiness trouble.
Don't forget to change their farm tiles into TP to keep growth down and increase GPT.