I keep running out of money!

[zeeter]

On Noble setting. It seems that just when I get to the point where I can put out Archer sentries and begin building Swordsmen, there goes the money. My tech drops to 40% or so, and if I keep building swordsmen it goes all the way to nothing and my workers start getting killed off. I've seen my enemies and they often have more cities than me, and are more technologically advanced.
This usually comes between the time of IW and Currency. Usually my civics don't change at all, so there's low maintenance for everything.

 

[Psyringe]

The easiest way to prevent money problems is to found religions. Use your first great prophets to build the shrines, so that you get 1 gold piece for any city that has "your" religion present. Further great prophets should be put into the holy city as super specialists, they generate 5 gold each. Then make your holy city a money machine. Build market, grocer, bank there as soon as you can.

Also, make sure to plant a lot of cottages. They take a little time to develop, but will pay off massively.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

One point, sentries (units outside your borders) cost more money than unit inside your borders.

 

[henrycccc]

yeah, keep your units in your borders, I tend to make the mistake of keeping my navy far offshore.

 

[zeeter]

Huh...didn't know that about the borders thing.

 

[Psyringe]

In the financial advisor screen, mouse over the lines for "units" and "support". You'll get some information about how the game calculates these values (not very intuitive though). When I went broke in my firt military-heavy game, I decided to check that screen regularly in my next game. Turned out that I expanded too fast, the city maintenance had eaten me up.

 

[The Condor]

Yeah, on any map it seems now (on noble) that after just three cities that are like five squares away knock my research from a good 90% to a 50%! Even with shrines, prophets, cottages and other stuff it is impossible for a long time to bounce back up from building cities no matter how close they are. Psyringe since your smart what should I do? I also swap civics (love slavery now) to cut cost and micromanage the crap out of things.

 

[doug2134]

Yea i just found new cities and build hammlets to get some quick cash, or just sell some of you tech for money to the other players.