How many cities for a Cultural Victory?

[Warlord Sam]

Hi all,

The only discussions/math I've seen for this question was regarding Vanilla. With all the changes G&K brought to the game (enough changes to make me actually start playing it in depth, finally), I've begun getting pretty serious about understanding the nitty gritty.

Is it still true that you don't want more than three cities max for a cultural victory? Seems like such a waste for the fourth city full of free stuff from tradition :/

If this has already been discussed for G&K, my apologies - but I did try to search and couldn't come up with anything. Cheers!

 

[Syntax Error]

3-4 is good. You can even go for more, just don't expect to win sub-300 when you do.

 

[Crafty Bison]

3-4 is usual, but anywhere from 1 to 6 can post very competitive times if you work to whatever civ specific advantage you have, adjust your policy order etc.

 

[Mondoflow]

Can anyone get me the formula for how much cities actually add to the costs? Base costs with one city? I can't seem to find accurate numbers anywhere. I'm playing as Ghandi in a game I intended to go for a cultural victory on, but an early counterattack against an early rush by Persia has left me with two of their cities. I really want to annex them so I can control their development and make them useful, but I can't figure out exactly how much that will affect my policy costs or how far back that would set me in terms of victory turn.

 

[The Pilgrim]

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=426776
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=389702&page=6

Not updated for G&K but the difference is not major. You're more than welcome to gather a more relevant info.

 

[Mondoflow]

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=426776
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=389702&page=6

Not updated for G&K but the difference is not major. You're more than welcome to gather a more relevant info.

I might just do that and see what I come up with. If stuff doesn't line up I'll post it here later.

 

[iconocast]

im pretty sure 5+ is very doable with some civs.

eg. celts liberty, ceilidh halls

 

[beezany]

Each city after your capital adds 15% to the cost of subsequent policies. Therefore, each new city is a drag on culture rate until it reaches 15% of your base production (capital, puppets, and allies). The Representation policy reduces the break-point to 10%.

In practice, a strong cultural civilization should reach a point where base production grows so high that most additional cities cannot even match 10%. Therefore, to maximize culture you should avoid building any unnecessary cities unless they offer a significant cultural advantage you cannot get with your capital alone (e.g., because of geography). You may need cities for other strategic reasons, but for culture, fewer is better.

Conversely, civilizations with weak base culture benefit from having as many cities as possible. If you don't have any puppets or allies, it's much easier to beat the 10% break-point, in which case every fully-developed city helps. However, in that case, you are also better suited to pursue other victory conditions.

 

[Genghis.Khan]

I would say this

Map Size|City Number
Duel |1 City
Tiny |2 Cities
Small |3 Cities
Standart |4 Cities
Large |5 Cities
Huge |6 Cities
Fun |One City Challange

 

[Tachii]

3-4 cities is best. Allows you to grow fast with Tradition.

3-4 cities with a few puppets is even better. Gold are usually hard to come by compared to other victory conditions and buying up culture CS ASAP before the AI does helps a lot since they will coup less and coup their recent allied CS instead. I recommend puppetting happens either where you got CBs first or Crossbowmen before your opponent does.

 

[adwcta]

Lots of diminishing returns on later cities. Keep in mind the cultural national wonder can only be built in one city (most likely your capital), and the +33% boost from piety tree will only apply to cities with wonders (which, on higher difficulties, when you are likely behind in tech going for culture; means you realistically won't be able to get them in more than 2-3 cities; and you have a preference to build the ones you really want in your capital anyway due to the fact that it'll probably have more hammers and the national wonder), the happiness-bonus culture from piety goes down with more cities due to unhappiness, CS bonuses and certain religion bonuses don't scale your # of cities, puppets give a static amount of culture, and you're better off planting all (or at least most, if you run out of population/land tiles) GAs and GPs in your capital anyway due to the national wonder.

I find that even the 4th city won't do more than at most match the 10% penalty (eventually, with quite a number of turns lost while it's being built up). But, you do get quite a bit more gold/science out of a 4th city, so it's a slower but safer victory imo, assuming you can find an empty spot that doesn't annoy other civs.

 

[beezany]

I really enjoy culture games, but I haven't experimented with them in depth. In particular, I haven't tried a one-city cultural victory. It seems that would be ideal, if you can build everything you need in the capital, but are there practical problems with OCC culture?

 

[Unresolved]

Would Representation from the Liberty tree be worth going for instead of Tradition if you're going for a 3-4 city culture game?

 

[adwcta]

Would Representation from the Liberty tree be worth going for instead of Tradition if you're going for a 3-4 city culture game?

I think most people would get both. Representation shaves down something like 20+ turns for 3 cities. You don't really need Patronage, since you only really care about the cultural CSs, which you can probably afford to upkeep without it, and Honor is no good unless you have a huge puppet empire.

@BWS - OCC suffers because you really can't get enough science, AND you are getting less culture than the 15% policy penalty of the second city (even if the second city has nothing but the basic culture buildings). You also get less Great Artists without more cities, which means significantly less culture in your capital for the last 100-ish turns (due to the Freedom finisher's multiplier). There's really no reason not to do 2 cities at least. If you run religion, excess happiness focus (with patronage and commerce), CSs, etc (meaning, all things that give you culture and do not scale with additional cities)... it will be mathematically less turns (not to mention easier, since you won't have to try to shoe-horn in a wonder in your third city) to victory with 2-City Tradition than a 3-city culture game with Liberty. Of course, 3-city will get you much more science/gold, which help in other ways.

For peaceful culture games, I tend to start tradition and then, based on surrounding AI/terrain, decide if I really want a third city (even if I do, I get Piety to the -10% policy first, then finish Freedom, before going back to Liberty). If a third city means you get DoW-ed even once more than you would without it, then I don't think it's worth it without being river+mountain+jungle.

 

[beezany]

In a four-city game, Representation will reduce culture cost from 1.45× to 1.3×, an increase of 11.5% in culture rate. It also grants an extra Golden Age. My gut feel is that this is comparable to the benefit of Aristocracy (+15% wonder production and +1 happiness per 10 citizens), maybe slightly better. Likewise, I think the Liberty opener is quite similar in effect to Legalism. Monarchy is better than Meritocracy for happiness in a small empire, but you can use the Liberty closer to plant a Great Artist. Therefore, Liberty and Tradition have similar culture benefits in a small empire, so I think the choice depends on which policy tree is better overall for a small empire, and Tradition should be the clear winner there.

Of course, you can always use both, in which case the question becomes, which policies to pursue first. Perhaps follow Liberty to Collective Rule, then Tradition to Legalism (which gives you time to prepare for better free culture buildings), then finish off the trees according to your situation.

 

[beezany]

OCC suffers because you really can't get enough science, AND you are getting less culture than the 15% policy penalty of the second city (even if the second city has nothing but the basic culture buildings).

If I've done my math correctly, culture victory requires 80,930 total culture with one city, which is reduced to about 73k with Religious Tolerance. A second city increases the goal to 84k, so it must produce over 11k total culture to have a net benefit. Basic culture buildings alone won't make up the difference, although with Liberty and Representation they come close.

As you point out, though, a second city has other benefits, including indirect culture production through Great Artists. Plus, you may be able to build additional wonders that your capital doesn't qualify for because of geography, so I can see the value in a second city. Beyond that becomes harder to justify, though.

 

[adwcta]

If I've done my math correctly, culture victory requires 80,930 total culture with one city, which is reduced to about 73k with Religious Tolerance. A second city increases the goal to 84k, so it must produce over 11k total culture to have a net benefit. Basic culture buildings alone won't make up the difference, although with Liberty and Representation they come close.

As you point out, though, a second city has other benefits, including indirect culture production through Great Artists. Plus, you may be able to build additional wonders that your capital doesn't qualify for because of geography, so I can see the value in a second city. Beyond that becomes harder to justify, though.

Are you factoring in specialists and golden age bonuses? I did the math a while back, and it pretty easily eclipsed one city, even without Liberty tree (but I may have given the 2nd city a random wonder like oracle or great wall; can't remember now).

 

[Crafty Bison]

Would recommend a city or two extra from what others have suggested, and 5 is very reasonable with pretty much any civ. Main reason being science. Don't worry about your culture per turn so much, worry about hitting the industrial super fast - then worry about culture per turn. The faster you hit the freedom finisher, the faster your utopia. Plus more cities makes the game more interesting for deciding when to tradition, liberty and piety.

 

[beezany]

Thanks for asking me to double-check my numbers, @adwcta; I had been underestimating a few things.

I loaded a game where I have a city with all the basic culture buildings, a Cathedral, and a Pagoda. Altogether it generates 63 culture: 19 from culture buildings, 5 from religious buildings, 1 from Liberty, 15 from specialists, +25% from Sistine Chapel, and +33% from broadcast tower. A Golden Age adds another 20% for 75 culture total. That's much higher than I expected, enough to cover the city penalty in about 120 turns with Representation. Because it takes a while to research and build everything, it will take longer than 120 turns from city founding, but it should still be fast enough for a Deity game.

Without the religious buildings, the city only generates 50 culture per turn, 60 in Golden Ages. That raises the break-even point to 150+ turns with Representation, 200+ turns without. I doubt that's fast enough to help in a Deity game, but it doesn't hurt much either. Therefore, you should avoid building vanilla cities, especially if you skip Liberty, but any city with strategic or cultural importance will pay for itself.

Interestingly, if you can get the Cathedral, even vanilla cities are attractive. With a strong religious civ, you might succeed with a wide-culture strategy.

 

[Browd]

No world wonder in that city, so no 33% boost from Reformation?