Great Merchant City worth it?

[dgonaz]

In my games I consistantly try to produce great merchants early in the game and create a great merchant city (never use them for caravans) and as a result I can often fund a much larger empire early on without cutting science. Later on I switch that city to producing great scientists since it has a larger food base (thanks to the great merchants). I was wondering if anyone else has tried this strategy and how it has worked out for them.

I only play marathon games by the way.

 

[svv]

Put your great merchants as super-specialists in the city with the shrine for a major religion. Put lots of farmland there, so you can make specialist priests and merchants. Build Wall Street there. It can end up generating quite a bit of income, as well as be a decent great person generator.

That's what I do with my great merchants (and my great prophets, after I'm done building shrines). I'll put my great engineers (and great scientists, after I'm done building academies) as super-specialists in my science city.

 

[Meatbuster]

"Amassing great merchants" strategy sounds like a good idea for a succession game. Who wants to start one?

 

[Thedrin]

Great merchant cities are definetly worth it if you're going for a warmongering game.

If you play a builder game your empire costs are relatively stable and your rate of research rarely takes a hit. Merchants and settled great merchants will be of less use since eventually (probably not after very long) you'll be able to keep research at 100%. By this point the added gold of these specialists has less and less value since you'll have enough money if you can run at 100%. If you war a lot you will regularly need to cover the increasing costs. Merchants allow you to do this without cutting back on your research.

Due to the lack of production it may be wise to only build the granary, market, grocer, bank and Wall St. Even these few buildings will take a long time to produce. If you get one great engineer in the game it's probably worth saving him for Wall St. Use temporary changes in tile improvements to put out the other buildings since, I assume, you're running caste system and can't slave the population.

Don't spread a religion you founded if you plan to run a merchant city. The combined gold is overkill - it is highly unlikely that your economy will be so wretched that you would need both sources of income. Furthermore spreading a religion can require the sacrifice of a lot of hammers on missionaries. A great merchant city is a further sacrifice of hammers since it produces little from tiles and merchants and great merchants produce no hammers. Personally, I always choose a merchant city to cover war costs over a shrine since they have the potential to generate far more gold.

Later on I switch that city to producing great scientists since it has a larger food base (thanks to the great merchants).

If you stop all wars and don't plan to return to them then fine. Otherwise stick to the merchants and set a large number of your cities to producing commerce.

 

[Tomb.]

The combined gold is overkill...

I dont think there is some kind of combined overkill at higher settings.

The combined gold is overkill A great merchant city is a further sacrifice of hammers since it produces little from tiles and merchants and great merchants produce no hammers.

This brought me to an idea. What a about whipping a city with settled GMs (probably with globe theater)? The extra food should be handy.

 

[voek]

I have been thinking of a strategy based on settled merchants on Emperor. Problem is I think it is needed to combine it with warmongering. Merchant wonders are mostly water based suggesting a watermap, making warmongering more difficult. With the right type of map and starting location I would build the Colossus and the Great Lighthouse and use the marketplace. Whipping with Globe there might also be good, but becomes less effective later in the game.

I would however also create another GP farm for scientist. Although 1 GP farm is usualy better, sometimes the control of GP's is more effective.

 

[Thedrin]

I dont think there is some kind of combined overkill at higher settings.

I would say that if you're running a lot of specialists then you may well be using representation and not universal sufferage. Aside from the odd unit upgrade, what would you use the money on? You would probably have to be doing a multifrontal war before you had enough units to require that level of gold for unit maintenance and supply.

The double loss of hammers is reason enough against it.

This brought me to an idea. What a about whipping a city with settled GMs (probably with globe theater)? The extra food should be handy.

If you're running a merchant city you're probably running caste system. Only 4 merchants are available to a city otherwise prior to Wall St. Unless you're a spiritual civ (and maybe not even then) whipping may be more trouble than its worth.