Corporations: Do you use them?

[Antilogic]

I'm really not sure how you can say that corporations are so powerful if you need to grind your research to a screeching halt to accomodate their costs.

You don't. An extra 10 food in a city from Cereal Mills or Sid's Sushi is basically another 5 specialists you can run, which can more than cover the cost of the corporation and then some. If you run Standard Ethanol or the other one that gives you science (Aluminum Co., I think?), you can get more science than you lose in gold in maintenance (and therefore increase your scientific output).

The thing is, it takes significant planning, and you can't use all the corporations effectively every game (unless you already control all the world's resources, and thus have already won a domination/conquest victory). If you simply found any corporation and just spread it like a wildfire, you will likely go bankrupt. However, if you pick one or two you want, and work intelligently to gather the resources, you can still run the same on your science slider while increasing your output. Not to mention spreading the corporation to another Civ will provide you with money without having to pay a maintenance cost, giving you even more money.

 

[Jabarto]

You don't. An extra 10 food in a city from Cereal Mills or Sid's Sushi is basically another 5 specialists you can run, which can more than cover the cost of the corporation and then some. If you run Standard Ethanol or the other one that gives you science (Aluminum Co., I think?), you can get more science than you lose in gold in maintenance (and therefore increase your scientific output).

The thing is, it takes significant planning, and you can't use all the corporations effectively every game (unless you already control all the world's resources, and thus have already won a domination/conquest victory). If you simply found any corporation and just spread it like a wildfire, you will likely go bankrupt. However, if you pick one or two you want, and work intelligently to gather the resources, you can still run the same on your science slider while increasing your output. Not to mention spreading the corporation to another Civ will provide you with money without having to pay a maintenance cost, giving you even more money.

But that's what I'm getting at; Cereal Mills only gives a third of a point of food per resource, and I have never had more than 10 such resources under my control, let alone the 30 I would need to get that 10 food. Sid's Sushi would require even more, though that's slightly less of an issue since seafood is usually pretty widespread.

And while I freely admit to being a poor player, I 'm not sure that spreading to the AI is a reliable enough way of offsetting the costs. If their economy can't handle it - and with maintenance costs rising above -25 per corp per city, it likely won't - they'll switch to Mercantilism and your money and time will have been in vain.

Also, just in case I gave the wrong impression, I don't think corps are useless. I admit they can be powerful under the correct curcumstances, but *anything* can be powerful if every favorable circumstance is present, and I don't feel corps are usually cost effective as they stand.

 

[Antilogic]

But that's what I'm getting at; Cereal Mills only gives a third of a point of food per resource, and I have never had more than 10 such resources under my control, let alone the 30 I would need to get that 10 food. Sid's Sushi would require even more, though that's slightly less of an issue since seafood is usually pretty widespread.

And while I freely admit to being a poor player, I 'm not sure that spreading to the AI is a reliable enough way of offsetting the costs. If their economy can't handle it - and with maintenance costs rising above -25 per corp per city, it likely won't - they'll switch to Mercantilism and your money and time will have been in vain.

Also, just in case I gave the wrong impression, I don't think corps are useless. I admit they can be powerful under the correct curcumstances, but *anything* can be powerful if every favorable circumstance is present, and I don't feel corps are usually cost effective as they stand.

If you play on smaller maps, the exchange rate is somewhat better (because there are fewer resources)--I don't know if there is a "sweet spot" where you end up slightly favored, but I end up getting ~1 to 9/8ths food or more per resource required for Cereal Mills on my small and standard maps. Also, after you found the corporation, you can export other resources to trade with AIs for resources you already have (as in, the ones you need to boost your corporations). So, even if you don't have a bunch of the resources in your territory or if you haven't conquered them, you can still maximize your benefits from one of the corporations by clever trading.

I didn't say it was easy. But, I've always been able to make a trade-off that I thought favored me (without killing my science budget) using corporations in every game I've played of BtS so far.

A side note: if those pesky AI are switching to Mercantilism, you can use the UN to force Environmentalism on the world. It'll hurt you, but it'll hurt the AI more if you already got him good enough to force him to switch to Mercantilism. Therefore, you benefit.

 

[Jabarto]

If you play on smaller maps, the exchange rate is somewhat better (because there are fewer resources)--I don't know if there is a "sweet spot" where you end up slightly favored, but I end up getting ~1 to 9/8ths food or more per resource required for Cereal Mills on my small and standard maps. Also, after you found the corporation, you can export other resources to trade with AIs for resources you already have (as in, the ones you need to boost your corporations). So, even if you don't have a bunch of the resources in your territory or if you haven't conquered them, you can still maximize your benefits from one of the corporations by clever trading.

Ahhh, okay, I didn't realize that. I only play on huge maps, so that could be a part of it.

A side note: if those pesky AI are switching to Mercantilism, you can use the UN to force Environmentalism on the world. It'll hurt you, but it'll hurt the AI more if you already got him good enough to force him to switch to Mercantilism. Therefore, you benefit.

That is true.

 

[tomaalimosh]

I only played one game with corporations, and that ruled. On huge maps at Marathon speed, you have a lot of resources available, and if you keep certain corporations local (the good ones = all except aluminum and ethanol ) you can trade a lot of resources from other civs.

The point is that you can get an instant boost of prod/culture/food in any city you want, and that means new or newly conquered cities as well. You can use the culture bomb tactic with 3-4 executives instead of a Great Artist. (it just takes a bit more than just one turn).

All in all... having 4 corporations helped me win the game, even if I had to keep research at 0-20%. however, if you spread them to other civs, they will start canceling trades with you, and you'll end up with smaller bonusses. If you want to go international, just use lame corporations like the Aluminum one. I mean... on huge maps, everybody usually has all resources, at least once... so... I see no point in this one... the 3 RP bonus is almost nothing, as the only resource it eats is coal...

So... corporations = IMBA

 

[Inky]

Corporations rock! I use Solver's patch now, but even without it smart use of corps offered big benefits. Solver's patch fixes other things than the corporation inflation costs, so it is worth using, but I think that it makes corps too good in the late game, so it isn't an exact preview of what the official corp balance fix will be. But it is way better than not using it, if you want to use corporations at all.

The first simple rule is: Found big corporations in Wall Street city. Whichever ones you are going to spread a lot, make sure you get the extra HQ money. 5 gold per corp city adds up quickly.

The food corps fund specialists, and that can favor running representation in the late game. So what if your science spending drops, if you make up for it with specialists. Sid's Soushi is especially good for this.

Mining Inc can pay for itself with "build wealth" in many cities.

If you win the game well before year 2000, the inflation isn't quite so bad. I think this emphasizes that inflation itself is what is too much, not just corporation costs.

Just one word for Corporation users: Rathaus. Holy Roman Empire is simply way too good at using them. Zulus aren't far behind. HRE has effectively half maintenance costs for using Corporations, which makes them obscenely good for them. Probably too good, and may be fixed in a patch, but take advantage of it while you can.

 

[Antilogic]

All in all... having 4 corporations helped me win the game, even if I had to keep research at 0-20%. however, if you spread them to other civs, they will start canceling trades with you, and you'll end up with smaller bonusses. If you want to go international, just use lame corporations like the Aluminum one. I mean... on huge maps, everybody usually has all resources, at least once... so... I see no point in this one... the 3 RP bonus is almost nothing, as the only resource it eats is coal...

So... corporations = IMBA

I figure out which corporation will benefit that Civ the least, and spread that one to as many of his cities as possible before they catch on and screw themselves with Mercantilism or State Property as opposed to being screwed by the corporations. It's so deliciously evil and decadent. Like a good chocolate cake.

 

[Tennyson]

1) Found Corporations in your Wall St. city.
2) Run Free Market. Even with Solver's patch, Environmentalism shuts down corps pretty hard. (But then, you can use them as a weapon against your opponent, so there are tradeoffs).
3) Profit. I love to get Cereal Mills, Creative Constructions, and Civ Jewelers all at the same time. I even save an artist, a merchant, and an engineer just to found them (probably not a good idea, really, but I'm not a deity player yet).

 

[Duuk]

1) Found Corporations in your Wall St. city.
2) Run Free Market. Even with Solver's patch, Environmentalism shuts down corps pretty hard. (But then, you can use them as a weapon against your opponent, so there are tradeoffs).
3) Profit. I love to get Cereal Mills, Creative Constructions, and Civ Jewelers all at the same time. I even save an artist, a merchant, and an engineer just to found them (probably not a good idea, really, but I'm not a deity player yet).

Running Free Market and putting your Corp HQ in your Wall Street/Market/Stock Exchange/Grocer city still runs many corps at a net loss.

If you're running your economy tightly you're not getting a big enough reward from the corps to offset their cost, it's usually smarter to just use a specialist economy or cottage spam and not run the added unhappiness and unhealthy issues from larger population that SS can bring in.

 

[Antilogic]

Running Free Market and putting your Corp HQ in your Wall Street/Market/Stock Exchange/Grocer city still runs many corps at a net loss.

Maybe it's just me, but I never seem to notice all these bugs in the game, nor do they affect my gameplay. I haven't had runaway inflation with corporations, and was able to run several corporations in my cities while "breaking even" on my budget (as in, I didn't have to drop the science spending while spreading my corporations around my empire).

I just must have been lucky this time around.

 

[CaptainF]

Mining Inc. is a corp I've found to come quite in handy.

 

[UnspokenRequest]

If they didn't cost great people, maybe they'd be more interesting.
My GP are usually too precious to waste on Corporations...

 

[UnspokenRequest]

The thing is, it takes significant planning...

That is a way to say it.
Another way would be that it takes a significant amount of micromanagement.
Yet another way would be that corporations are odd and actually quite tedious to take care of.

When you've got to do a good bunch of maths solely to determine whether a game feature would be detrimental to build or not, it ceases being fun for me.
The question "am I hurting myself by building this thing" is not a fun question to ask yourself during a game.
When I take the time and effort to build something, it shouldn't hurt me. It can be sub-optimal and a slight waste of hammer (i.e. a colosseum in a production city with no happiness and no boundary problem in sight), but it still gives benefits, even though marginal ones.
With corporation, not only do you lose a great people and hammers (CEOs), but if you haven't thought things through properly, you're actually destroying your economy.
Call me stupid, if you want to, but this game mechanic is just too much trouble for its worth.

 

[Spammurabi]

I use them with Solver's patch. Without the patch, I would be running State Property as soon as I got Communism.

 

[^alon^]

Thank you for ruining my poll with an idiotic response.

Side note: You wait 2 years to make an on-topic post, and THIS is what you use it on? I'm stunned.

haaaaaaaaaaaaaa

graet comeback!!!!!

 

[Loki cdn]

I use corps to pillage my vassals supply of gold. At the same time boosting their production.

 

[L4zXX0r]

I really love Sid's Sushi Company. Infact, other Civ's love it too. I had one game where I founded it, and at the point I had it, all of my cities had courthouses and most had marketplaces. So the cost wasn't that bad. I also had 3 or 4 holy cities, so that made up a lot of the money as well. Best thing about Sid's Sushi... I spread it out to other civs, and they spread it around like wildfire. I have yet to get far enough to do much more... Darn marathon/18 civ HUGE maps.

 

[Peng Qi]

I'm really not sure how you can say that corporations are so powerful if you need to grind your research to a screeching halt to accomodate their costs.

I built a city on a weak cultural border in the late-game. Putting Sid's Sushi in it pushed the border back to a full fat cross and made the city competitive with even my starting cities in a matter of 20-30 turns (I was getting some +12 food and somewhere in the realm of +25 culture from SS).

 

[number51]

I am playing my first BTS game, and wanted to try some different things so I am playing chieftain level (what a wimp). As Darius I am rolling in $$$$$$$$$ and killing everyone. Perfect time to try corps.

Yikes! What a nightmare. I went with the construction corporation and it killed my finance. I figured I need to spread it around, things get worse. It did accomplish one thing:

The blowout game got much closer.

UnspokenRequest summed it up for me:

"The question "am I hurting myself by building this thing" is not a fun question to ask yourself during a game."

 

[Peng Qi]

"The question "am I hurting myself by building this thing" is not a fun question to ask yourself during a game."

A skilled gamer would ask that question every time he built anything.