Great Depression

[DamienDCLXVI]

So in the 3 games I have been able to play to completion I have had a problem. Around the time I hit industrial my Economy CRASHES but about 200 GPT. Does anyone else have this problem? Am I doing something wrong?
Is there something I am missing around this time period that will increase unit, building or tile maintenance?

 

[bryanw1995]

do you have lots of units and/or puppet states? unit maintenance costs are extremely high, and they get higher as you field more units. great people, workers, settlers, etc all count as a unit, too. also, cripple all of your puppet states with tp's instead of mines/farms, you'll get lots of gold from them that way even if they spam you with armory/barracks/etc.

 

[vendur]

Do you have a decent amount of puppets? my guess is they just got around to building so much useless crap they are costing you more money than they make, and you may have too many units. You only need a couple works usually, on a standard map/settings. I know a lot of times I have far more workser than I need.

 

[Sporknife]

are you automating your workers? they might be building railroads everywhere, and those cost 2gpt each.

 

[tibbles]

I'd bet on automated workers if they build railroads. Though even that, you would notice a steady decline, not a crash. Unit costs don't scale up that fast either. Oh, but if this is midconquest period, your unit costs may go up a lot via captured workers. Sell most off.

I just finished a game with like 30 puppets (they did all have trade routes) and was bringing in like 400gpt without a golden age. And they had built all the high end useless junk too like military academies and factories. So puppets shouldn't inherently crash you.

 

[DamienDCLXVI]

I am suspecting that I just didn't notice that I was coming down of a golden age mid conquest. It seems that unit MX was the main culprit. Once I gifted a bunch off for a proxy war things calmed down. Just me trying to feel out how to succeed in Civ 5 I guess.

 

[S.K. Ren]

I have noticed that randomly my Civ's GPT will drop about 100 or so randomly then rise back up. It has to do with all your cities simultaneously completing a building and usually recovers when they all gain a Pop, raising your trade income. At least that's what happens to me.

 

[Horizons]

Most likely culprit is that you are letting the AI 'governors' manage your citizen allocation and specialists.

 

[pi-r8]

It's not surprising. The industrial era vastly increases your production abilities, but also offers a lot of buildings with expensive upkeep. Railroads are also expensive. Meanwhile it does nothing to increase your gold, other than stock exchanges which take forever to build and still don't do much.

Try to use as many harbors as possible instead of railroads, and don't make buildings you don't need.

 

[DamienDCLXVI]

Yeah, I am working on Harbor optimization now. Any city farther than like 6 road tiles would be better with a harbor yes? and the RR should be half correct?

 

[pi-r8]

Yeah, I am working on Harbor optimization now. Any city farther than like 6 road tiles would be better with a harbor yes? and the RR should be half correct?

actually, any city farther than 3 road tiles is better with a harbor. (road tiles are 1 gold each, harbour is 3). For RR, every city is better off with a harbour.

 

[S.K. Ren]

The exception being cities for SS parts. You really want that move bonus.

 

[Licinia Eudoxia]

Another thing to look for is if a non-allied unit is standing on a road that connects some of your cities, or a vital resource for a city. That is something that can drastically reduce your Gold Per Turn.

 

[Gath]

Build more trading posts, and fewer buildings.