Effectively generating gpt

[Cavalyn]

Hi all,

There are plenty of posts around here about how to best go about getting science empires, or even food empires...

But what type of style best allows for massive gold production? Would a taller empire make more sense, or a wide one? Also in what ways do you specialise cities for gold, and i dont just mean "markets, banks etc..." What tile improvements do you focus on, what terrain do you look for?

Do you try and grow them to high levels, or cap them at just 3-4??

Basically I either run tall or wide but i never actively plan my gpt, if it's high or low, it always just seems like a consequence...

I play on marathon-immortal, if that effects anything...

 

[dthompson32]

I just read a guide in the War Academy that explains trade routes. It has a lot of useful information about that aspect of GPT.

Bottom line - I found out I'm building roads too early, and not using Harbors right.

 

[chazzycat]

wide is better for gold for the most part, due to trade routes - but only if you keep your cities growing constantly. capping them means your income stops growing, so get more happiness instead of letting your cities stagnate.

don't build too many buildings or troops if you don't need them, maintenance is a killer.

using tithe for your religion along with itenerant preachers or religious texts can be quite effective if you have good religion.

always prioritize riverside cities first, rivers make a huge difference for gold.

build farms at first to boost growth. generally you don't want to be working TPs until later in the game after economics, remember extra population gives +1 gold to the trade route value so it's a total wash to work TPs early instead of growing.

lastly, puppets are HUGELY beneficial to your GPT. Probably the easiest way to guarantee an increase in GPT is to acquire a couple puppets. Build trading posts to increase gold even more and keep the population relatively low.

 

[alpaca]

The problem is that trading posts are so weak that you can't reliably force an early gold strategy. I recommend settling near luxuries (which is a no-brainer anyways) and rivers. This provides you with a fair amount of cash influx. Go wide and build markets in every city, they not only provide +25% but also +2 flat in each city and they have a truly excellent cost/benefit ratio. On higher difficulties you can get a lot of gold from trading luxuries and strategic resources to the AI (I usually trade for gpt as I think the AI should never agree to trade a large lump sum for resources unless it's very unhappy, which it never is).

 

[mike678]

As said wide is better at generating gold for the obvious reason that you have more land to plop down trade posts. I put markets on all plains, grass land and jungles that are not connected to water. The exception would be extreme lack of food or lack of production I'll throw a lumber mill down on a forest.

Tithe is your best friend as it gives you tons of gold. On my average immortal game I can get around 75-100 gold per turn from tithe alone. If you complete commerce it adds an extra gold per trade post. Also dip down into rationalism for free though to get crazy extra ammounts of science.

By the late game following this strategy I can get 300-500 gpt.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

If you're going for a gold economy, an important tech path would be the one involving Currency, Banking, Economics (very crucial if you have trade posts/puppets, still provides a healthy amount of gold otherwise), and possibly Industrialization if you want to get Big Ben for cheaper rush buys.

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

You want to get as much pop as possible wo works tiles which gives alot of gold. You also want as much pop possible for trade routes but roads cost money to have which means that you want as few roads possible. Many buildings cost gold to have which means that you want as few of these as possible. At the same time you want the buildings which give you gold modifier and allows merchant specialist which you want to run as many as possible so that you get alot of great merchants. I can't say if wide your tall is better here but many people probably say wide because tall tends to have farms instead of trade post but a tall empire which focus on gold may maybe outpeform a wide goldfocused empire.