[C3C] Best government type throughout a match

That's depends on the size of the map and empire. The larger the empire, the more communism is going to win over republic, but I tested it a few times and repo had less production, but still a higher income.

 

I tend to play with smaller empires, but that may just be because I don't ramp up Map size past normal if I want a quick game, which is the kind of game I have played primarily in the last few years.

I have been using Republic, and while I was surprised by the massive deficit I went into at first, I bounced back from that after about 15 turns of building Marketplaces and some other improvements. One problem I have faced in some of my Continents matches is that I'm by and far the leader of the game until about Industrial era, then when we discover the other Civs on the other continent, they outclass me enough that I can't catch up. This Republic game when I discovered them I was still the leader, but it was very narrow margin.

 

The only time I've tried communism, in a PTW 100k game with a huge map, it was a total disaster. Instead of a core of productive cities (and a huge pile of totally corrupt cities), I had 400 or so totally corrupt cities and no productive ones. I won't be trying that again.

 

This makes it invalid for C3C. Conquests uses a different corruption system.

 

Yes, indeed it does, which is why I mentioned I was playing PTW. However, in Conquests there is absolutely no reason (besides role-playing) to ever switch to communism, so this will remain the only time I've done it.

 

Yes there is.

A fully developed communism can reach around 50% corruption at most. Assuming you play at Sid (which matters most, at emperor rank corruption will be much lower) on a standard size map and have 180 cities as a commercial tribe(matters little for corruption, but matters for commerce), then your corruption will be 50.15244%, which can be reduced further with policemen.

You can irrigate enough tiles so that your metropolises no longer have corruption and waste. While you have corrupted shields and corrupted commerce, policemen are quite effective. If irrigation allows you to fully utilize another policemen, then it is the smart choice. As irrigation will also mitigate production, having still one shield remain corrupt can make sense.

If (while playing a commercial tribe) you manage to exceed 369 cities on a huge map, then rank corruption may exceed 50%. At 400 cities you may have 58.4% rank corruption and 64.65% corruption in total. This still can be reduced further with policemen. I would like to point out that those numbers of cities are extreme. At 512 cities possible in total that will be up to 112 cities remaining for all other tribes.

Playing at 70% water there will likely be less than 320 metropolises in total. 320 metropolises equal 40% of all 160x160/2=12800 tiles being used at 16 tiles per metropolis. If in addition to 40% land tiles further 10% of all tiles can be used as water tiles, then up to 50% of all tiles can be used which equals 400 metropolises at 16 tiles per metropolis.

At below Sid it is hardly possible to exceed 50% rank corruption. Playing a noncommercial tribe at Deity one needs the following amount of cities for a fully developed communism to exceed 50% rank corruption.

Huge: 425
Large: 331
Standard: 237
Small: 201
Tiny: 166

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/everything-about-corruption-c3c-edition.76619/

 

as said before, if your empire is big enough that the added production from communal corruption AND the lack of WW from Communism outweighs the tile commerce bonus of Republic, it is a viable strategy to switch govs.

 

The blessing and curse of playing Continents maps. I play well enough to dominate my land mass, in a good place until Astronomy and Navigation let me find the other continent.

• Sometimes the AI over there have fallen into a stasis, with 3 medium-sized empires that I can compete with
• Sometimes an AI over there had a really good start, and has rolled over 2 of its neighbors to become a juggernaut

I usually play for a Space Victory, so I will have Galleons to upgrade to Transports and perform a transcontinental invasion to counteract the juggernaut. That's part of the fun; deciding when, where, and how to invade. Do I wait for Flight, so that I can instantly reinforce? Do I invade right after I get Replaceable Parts and use Cavalry and Infantry? Or do I invade with Cavs and Riflemen, to get a base of operations in the other hemisphere, and plan for a much larger expansion in a few turns?

 

In part this can be offset by giving commerce and thus research a higher priority as i often prefer. Also using curraghs or galley to venture reaching the other continent is of the essense. Waiting till ocean can be crossed safely is a major mistake.

 

Agreed. I *try* to find the other continent as soon as I can build a curragh. First, meet all the tribes on my continent and look for shallow water crossings.

I understand about sending galleys out into sea tiles and rolling the dice. I don't always do it early, since I'm conserving shields for use on land.

Finding the other continent is one thing. Invading successfully is quite another.

 

One interpretation would be that trying to take out the civilizations on the home continent sets you back in technology. Peaceful coexistence and tech trading is the better way, at least for some time. Shields will be plenty soon enough. After you can trade techs with both continents the merits of not taking your entire continent mitigate.

 

Sorry that I'm not making myself clear.

Very early game - Build a few curraghs, send them in opposite directions around my land mass. Try to meet everyone and trade with them. Expand onto good land, build workers. Shields are focused on settlers, warriors or archers, granaries or barracks. I find it hard to spare shields for suicide curraghs, which are 2-move anyway.

Early game (after Map Making, still Ancient Age) - Acquire Iron Working, determine how to get iron if I don't have it. Continue to fill available land, improve worked tiles. Probably prepare for the first land war. I might have a galley or two probing sea tiles, but I still focus my shields on barracks, swords, horsemen or catapults.

To your point, I don't think that wars in the Ancient Age always slow down my tech progress. I have had games where one of my aggressive neighbors (Monty, Shaka) had better land in his core and invaded me, which put me on the back foot a bit. But making good decisions about improving tiles and grabbing resources and luxuries should keep my economy and tech rate humming along.

Crossing into Middle Ages, before Astronomy - This would be a great time to meet tribes on the other continent, as you point out. It's a lot of luck, whether my probing galleys find a path, or an island, or meet one of the AI galleys. Since we can't trade resources yet over Sea or Ocean tiles, the diplomatic advantage is focused on tech trading at this point. A few cities have grown so that they could produce extra galleys for suicide missions. Those cities are also the ones who produce my knights, MDI, pikes and trebs for wars on my land mass. It's a choice, a conscious decision about priorities.

 

Actually this is not the time i had in mind.

Preferable is the ancient age before leaving despotism. Ideal perhaps would be anarchy itself for the crossing, so cheap curraghs would be built just before. If no sucess occurs a few turn after that can also be a good time as towns need to grow which means they cannot build workers, but their production is still too low for expensive buildings. Cheap Curraghs can be built in numbers.

 

I was not familiar with the concept of the suicide curraghs, thanks for brining that to my attention. This would appear to me to be luck-based, if you so happen to find shallow waters that get you close enough to their borders. This would probably be possible on the smaller map sizes in the majority of cases, I'll have to give it a try.

I find that up until the mid-late Middle Ages, I am well above the other Civs on my continent, then I began the stagger. This may be the time to strike, since tech-wise I am well above them so I should on average have better units. Just have to manage the transition from economic works to military works to prevent sneak attacks into my core cities.

 

As a general rule, until Cavs are being wielded by the AI, your core towns should be reasonably well protected by the buffer zone of 'non-core' towns around them. And only those outer, more corrupt towns that are in imminent danger of being sneak-attacked (i.e. their garrison can be attacked in a single interturn from the other side of an AI border, by that AI's fastest currently available units) really need to be permanently garrisoned.

For example (and although admittedly I rarely follow this advice myself, because I'm not brave enough!), coastal towns which are not adjacent to an AI land-border can often be left completely ungarrisoned, especially during the early game/ at lower difficulty levels, while the AI's lower productivity means it (still) can't muster decent naval-invasions. Instead, a small stack of fast units (Horses, Knights or Cavs) can be used as a "rapid-reaction force" capable of covering multiple (coastal) towns. And once you have a thin rail-net in place in the early Industrial, an only slightly larger stack can cover your entire empire.

 

I wonder why that is as i would expect the opposite to be true.

Before the middle of the middle age the general strategic situation is still somewhat fragile. But by the middle of the middle age all core towns have (long) reached city size. This means that the gross economic output is high and a free unit support of 3 per city as a republic means that expenses for unit support can be dropped to zero. This implies researching at 4 turns per tech and possibly making money in the process because maximum research funding would be too high for 4 turns per tech.

Soon cavalry can be built and with cavalry you will have a military advantage that begs to be used. This is the time to get a MGL to unlock the military academy which makes your armies stronger. It clearly is a must have and there no longer is an excuse to wait for unlocking it.

 

It's an interesting mechanic. If you select a ship (curragh or galley) and tell it "go to here" multiple tiles away, the pathfinding algorithm will always choose a safe path, keeping your in shallow water. If you are manually moving your ship (I nearly always use the number pad keys), you may send it directly out into deep water. With some planning, you can move close to an island, then boldly go where no one has gone before! It's likely your ship will be lost in deep water, but there's a small chance it will survive. Go further! If it is lost the next turn, you have still illuminated a portion of the deep ocean. Repeat the probing in other likely portions of the ocean, until you succeed.

How many galleys do you want to risk? In the Strategy Articles forum Ginger Ale has a detailed post about testing the chances for sinking for these ships. In that post, Scoutsout goes further with probability analysis, for those ships and their chances of success. Each ship costs shields to build, so you're investing those shields to make contact with the other continent. Nearly all the suicide boats will die. How many shields will you lose to make that contact earlier?

 

Not prioritizing map making can make sense to build cheaper curraghs instead. In the end those shields are a reasonable investment even if many ships sink.

What can be a greater trouble is unit support as an early republic. Once you have entered the republic you donnot want to have more than 2 ships at the same time. So lets calculate it backwards. You want to have (up to) 2 curraghs safely having reached the other continent. You estimate that they need to spent 2 turns in unsafe waters when playing a non-seafaring civ. Chances of surviving 2 turns in unsafe waters are 25%. So you want to have built 2/0.25=8 curraghs by the time you leave despotism. Sinkings will occur during anarchy. Once you are a republic the investment will yield contacts.

If too many curraghs survive you may need to disband some of them due to unit support.

 

I tend to find that by the time I make it to the other continent(s), there are already plenty of barbarian galleys floating around and willing to 'disband' my boats for me...

 

Thanks for the analysis. Curraghs only have movement 2, as I recall. Most of the oceans I have seen on my continents maps are 8 or or more tiles across. With their slow movement, curraghs would have to survive 4 or more turns in unsafe waters. The probabilities are really stacked against that happening. Galleys have movement 3, so that could be crossed in 2 or 3 turns in unsafe waters. Still a recipe for losing a lot of ships, especially if I chose to cross at a latitude where the ocean is 10 tiles wide.

Having said that, I'm definitely going to try this in my next continents game. Build 8 curraghs while in despotism, move them into position, then send them out during the anarchy while I have revolted to republic.