Quick Questions and Answers

[Browd]

When you take a pantheon, the pantheon belief will automatically appear in your existing and future founded cities (until you found a religion). But, once your pantheon is overtaken by another civ's religion in a given city, your pantheon can never reappear in that city.

The War Academy religion articles may help. This article is the intro and contains links to the more detailed articles.

 

[beetle]

Your cities will all start with your pantheon, but if you don’t found, it is short lived and, since you can’t build missionaries, it will die out.

 

[JohnYoga]

Hello!

I am in a fairly new game, playing Poland, and have pasture all around me; it appears that it's at least 80% of my visible land area, thus far. My thought is that I can make a lot of food, and create a huge population civilization.

Which is better: build many cities (wide), or have few (2-3, very, very tall)?

Is there an optimal City Pop size, or at least a recommended minimum (e.g. "For an optimally functioning city, one should have at least 22 Pop, but no more than 40"?).
Is there a size cap you get to where you say to yourself, "it is now optimally the best time to build the next city"?

Thanks for any advice.

Regards,

Marc

 

[joncnunn]

Hello!

I am in a fairly new game, playing Poland, and have pasture all around me; it appears that it's at least 80% of my visible land area, thus far. My thought is that I can make a lot of food, and create a huge population civilization.

Which is better: build many cities (wide), or have few (2-3, very, very tall)?

Is there an optimal City Pop size, or at least a recommended minimum (e.g. "For an optimally functioning city, one should have at least 22 Pop, but no more than 40"?).
Is there a size cap you get to where you say to yourself, "it is now optimally the best time to build the next city"?

Thanks for any advice.

Regards,

Marc

Some threads on the tall vs wide debate cover tons of pages.

Self founding few is easier (Monarchy, the 100% national wonder rule, happiness counter induced golden ages), but most people go with a total of 4 self founded cities including the capital instead of 2 or 3. You can attach a wide empire to a tall core easily via conquest (and puppet at times that it won't interfere with national wonder construction)

Going tall, optimum pop size is as big as you can get it, especially in the capital with Monarchy's elimination of half the pop based unhappiness.

 

[Phalanx300]

So four cities is generally what you want to have when going tall?

 

[Sessy]

So four cities is generally what you want to have when going tall?

there's a lot of reasons to found cities, but when going tall, you have more citizens/city, so happiness is more dedicated to citizens. Also note that you normally go into full tradition, which grant bonuses for your first 4 cities.

 

[JohnYoga]

there's a lot of reasons to found cities, but when going tall, you have more citizens/city, so happiness is more dedicated to citizens. Also note that you normally go into full tradition, which grant bonuses for your first 4 cities.

The reason why I ask is that I thought I read somewhere in CivFanatics that BNW punishes players that like to go wide (e.g. your unhappiness rises much higher then if you had a "tall" empire). I think I also read that tall civs can arrive at a Science victory much easier vs. a wide empire. India, and perhaps some other select Civs further encourage tall empires...

Am I wrong here(?): BNW = punishes city sprawl.

Regards,

Marc

 

[Crimson13]

If a proposal in the World Congress doesn't get any votes does that mean it fails? There's a proposal that I ain't liking (Sanction City-States) but I want to know if I can buy everyones vote for mine and have the other automatically fail.

 

[Browd]

WC proposals only pass if there are more yes votes for that proposal than no votes. Any tie (including a 0-0 tie) means the proposal doesn't pass.

 

[Sessy]

The reason why I ask is that I thought I read somewhere in CivFanatics that BNW punishes players that like to go wide (e.g. your unhappiness rises much higher then if you had a "tall" empire). I think I also read that tall civs can arrive at a Science victory much easier vs. a wide empire. India, and perhaps some other select Civs further encourage tall empires...

Am I wrong here(?): BNW = punishes city sprawl.

Regards,

Marc

You're right, the game mechanics do punish ICS by increasing culture and science costs by 10% of the base cost for every city, and each city generates 3 unhappiness, except for Gandhi. But that certainly does not mean you cannot overcome the penalties, cities generate science, culture, faith, gold etc. and are almost always worth it. Tall civs can reach SV earlier because the infrastructure is easier to build and manage, IMO the wide empires come online too late in the game if you're a builder and not a conqueror. I think the reason players are hardly ever punished for going tall is the fact that you have fewer tiles, luxuries etc. that you lose out on simply by not having enough cities.

 

[JohnYoga]

You're right, the game mechanics do punish ICS by increasing culture and science costs by 10% of the base cost for every city, and each city generates 3 unhappiness, except for Gandhi. But that certainly does not mean you cannot overcome the penalties, cities generate science, culture, faith, gold etc. and are almost always worth it. Tall civs can reach SV earlier because the infrastructure is easier to build and manage, IMO the wide empires come online too late in the game if you're a builder and not a conqueror. I think the reason players are hardly ever punished for going tall is the fact that you have fewer tiles, luxuries etc. that you lose out on simply by not having enough cities.

Thank you for responding, Sessy. I appreciate it!

Regards,

Marc

 

[Sarin]

I don't fully understand the mechanics behind the We Love The King Day...

In last game, I went tall with four cities, staying that way most of the game. I began keeping cities only around modern age, when I took Celtic capital. I didn't get WLTKD there at all (no prompt that it desires this or that luxury). Okay...some time later, after capturing another capital, I built a new city on a nice spot-near center of the pangea, so very useful as airbase/missile silo, and with two uranium deposits within range...just sweet. But I didn't get WLTKD at all there either. So I'm puzzled about it....

 

[mokyo24]

Ok, I got 2 not so short questions:

1. How does gaining influence over a CS influence your relationships with other civs and does the method affect it? Many times I would gain influence by doing something I'd do anyway, like spawning a prophet and then very next turn I'd have multiple leaders complaining. And they're not even allied with influenced CS! Such whiners...

2. Many times the AI would not accept a luxury I'm trading them and would usually ask for several other things. Are they doing this because I have multiple copies? If yes do they just check it in the trading screen or they just know how many sources I have, even unimproved ones? If it's the former, maybe I can trick them by improving luxuries one at time.

I don't fully understand the mechanics behind the We Love The King Day...

In last game, I went tall with four cities, staying that way most of the game. I began keeping cities only around modern age, when I took Celtic capital. I didn't get WLTKD there at all (no prompt that it desires this or that luxury). Okay...some time later, after capturing another capital, I built a new city on a nice spot-near center of the pangea, so very useful as airbase/missile silo, and with two uranium deposits within range...just sweet. But I didn't get WLTKD at all there either. So I'm puzzled about it....

Like, the captured and new cities never requested anything? The captured cities, did you annex or puppet them? The one about the new city is indeed baffling. Did you end the game it not requesting anything?

 

[Sarin]

Ok, I got 2 not so short questions:

1. How does gaining influence over a CS influence your relationships with other civs and does the method affect it? Many times I would gain influence by doing something I'd do anyway, like spawning a prophet and then very next turn I'd have multiple leaders complaining. And they're not even allied with influenced CS! Such whiners...

2. Many times the AI would not accept a luxury I'm trading them and would usually ask for several other things. Are they doing this because I have multiple copies? If yes do they just check it in the trading screen or they just know how many sources I have, even unimproved ones? If it's the former, maybe I can trick them by improving luxuries one at time.



Like, the captured and new cities never requested anything? The captured cities, did you annex or puppet them? The one about the new city is indeed baffling. Did you end the game it not requesting anything?

1. Basically...each leader got his ideas about his "sphere of influence". If you tread into it, the relations will go down quickly. Even your closest ally will abandon you, denounce you and even DoW you if you expand somewhere he wanted or you ally CS (s)he wanted. Problem is, as the empires grow, AI usually gets unreasonable ideas about those. I've had AI "covet the lands I own" and "competed for same city states" even if my empire and those CS were on the other side of pangea continent.

2. That happens when AI has only one piece of that luxury available, and you want to buy it. Lux for lux or equal value doesn't interest them, as they have nothing to gain from such trade.

And about my cities...I realized one thing that might be the problem. It is late game and thanks to CS allies I have access to every kind of lux resource. The old cities are locked into perpetual WLTKD due to that...so maybe, when I get new city when already owning all luxuries, the game figures they don't need anything and doesn't start the WLTKD prompt at all.

Oh, and those cities, I annexed them. I rarely puppet cities, I just don't like not being in complete control of my own lands.

 

[Primacide]

Ok, I got 2 not so short questions:

1. How does gaining influence over a CS influence your relationships with other civs and does the method affect it? Many times I would gain influence by doing something I'd do anyway, like spawning a prophet and then very next turn I'd have multiple leaders complaining. And they're not even allied with influenced CS! Such whiners...

2. Many times the AI would not accept a luxury I'm trading them and would usually ask for several other things. Are they doing this because I have multiple copies? If yes do they just check it in the trading screen or they just know how many sources I have, even unimproved ones? If it's the former, maybe I can trick them by improving luxuries one at time.

Gaining influence over CS will always bring conflict from the other AI players. There's just no helping it. The AI seems to react most when you flip one of their CS allies, but I have no data to back that up - just an observation. The method by which you gain the CS influence doesn't matter at all.

When your relations with an AI are poor (or sometimes even just fair), they start to want more and more for their spare luxuries. I learned the hard way that it's better to figure out a way to keep the lux by overpaying the AI than to lose access to the extra copy. If you think it's expensive when the AI has an extra lux and doesn't like you, just wait till you want his only copy and he still doesn't like you.

Your extra copies don't matter by the way. The AI doesn't care if you have one or ten. If you only have one, by the way, watch out. The AI will come to you between turns and make an offer on that one lux. (Your own trade screen may falsely report that you have two). If you agree, you will lose that lux for thirty turns. Try to only negotiate during your turn to avoid this bug (it's roughly caused by a deal you formerly had for the lux with that civ and another deal timing out on the same turn).

 

[Sarin]

I just made a transition from Prince to King, and my game is, unsurprisingly, getting a bit rougher. AI managed to beat me to two wonders I wanted-Chichen Itza and Notre Dame. Quite a bugger...

My dilemma is about Great Artists. In Prince games, I used one of my first to pop a great work, so it could be used with the one from Parthenon to trade GW and get max theming bonus from Louvre, and filled all the rest of art slots with artifacts. But now, without Chichen Itza and less artifacts probably available, should I start using more GAs for GW? I'm not really gearing up for cultural vic...

BTW...map is Oceania/large, as Indonesia, with a little mod of my own that switches the "sea resources only" building bonuses to all sea tiles, so sea tiles can almost produce as much as land tiles....

 

[beetle]

should I start using more GAs for GW? I'm not really gearing up for cultural vic...

CV or not, GA are more valuable for golden ages than GW. That said, theming bonus are also very nice. So use GA for GW only when it gets you a theming bonus. Otherwise, use GW from antiquity sites (from tiles more than three hexes from your cities), and don’t stress about filling museums. So that is 3 GA for Hermitage (which you should build every game) and maybe one more for Louvre (if you build that, it pops with one GA). If you get Uffizi, fill it from antiquity sites, not GA. And, as you note, Parthenon saves you a GA.

 

[andreafin]

what is the biggest map civ 5 can handle - i dont mean the biggest anyone has made so far or can make due to limitations with the world builder or anything, i mean theoretical size if someone made their own tool or could make a blank map and import it into world builder to work on? is there any hard limit?

 

[chuckh89]

Do free Tech. Ruins only provide Ancient Era technologies,...Don't recall ever getting anything later..??

I found a cluster of Ruins the AI ignored and popped them all on the same turn, none were Tech. So my assumption is they are restricted to the Ancient Era.

Yes or No?

 

[IronfighterXXX]

I found a cluster of Ruins the AI ignored and popped them all on the same turn, none were Tech. So my assumption is they are restricted to the Ancient Era.

Yes or No?

Yes