I understand food, production.. but what about commerce?

[MBison]

I understand why you need to collect food and why you need to have production... but what is commerce good for?

In my recent game, which I won at the time limit, I had a fairly hefty bank and was earning like +30 per turn. I used most of my gold to upgrade military units during my war with the Russians. But what else is it used for? I had research at 100% and still +30 per turn (which probably sucks but I'm still new).

Thanks for any tips.

 

[Greek Plunder]

I understand why you need to collect food and why you need to have production... but what is commerce good for?

In my recent game, which I won at the time limit, I had a fairly hefty bank and was earning like +30 per turn. I used most of my gold to upgrade military units during my war with the Russians. But what else is it used for? I had research at 100% and still +30 per turn (which probably sucks but I'm still new).

Thanks for any tips.

Well, if you are in the red with commerce, and you're in trouble to dip below 0 dollars in your treasury, I BELIEVE the game forces you to put money into it. So, if you don't pay attention to it, you won't be able to do any research and/or culture research. I believe it does, anyways, as it happened to me once. It's also good for trading with the AI, for techs, units, war-declarations, whatever. Also, with the proper civics, you can HURRY production of buildings with gold (VERY useful).

To further expand on what I said originally, you need gold to pay for civic upkeep, as well. With some civics, you also need it to pay for your army (I believe). hm, there are a lot of reasons you need it. Like I said, no gold, no research.

 

[Shillen]

If you're running 100% science and still making money with nothing to spend it on then you need to build or capture more cities. More cities will increase your maintenance costs, so you won't be running positive at 100% science anymore, but at the same time you'll be generating a lot more beakers and hammers from those extra cities.

 

[Pinstar]

If your treasury hits 0 the game will automatically reduce your science spending to avoid forcing your units to disband.

 

[lordqarlyn]

You need to increase your overall commerce. Try building some extra cottages, while they start off small, when they get to towns, particularly in combo with some advances and civics, they can really generate commerce, which will boost both your research and cash flows.

Don

 

[Rabbit_Alex]

You need to increase your overall commerce. Try building some extra cottages, while they start off small, when they get to towns, particularly in combo with some advances and civics, they can really generate commerce, which will boost both your research and cash flows.

Don

What he said.

 

[Alistic]

I wonder how come sometimes when your at 100% science rate you still get a profit. Clearly your not spending 100% on science unless that represents a cap of how much you are allowed to spend. So really if you make more commerce beyond 100% science, it doesent add to the science bonus. It would add more value to having an even higher commerce rate if it did.

 

[shortguy]

I wonder how come sometimes when your at 100% science rate you still get a profit. Clearly your not spending 100% on science unless that represents a cap of how much you are allowed to spend. So really if you make more commerce beyond 100% science, it doesent add to the science bonus. It would add more value to having an even higher commerce rate if it did.

It's 100% of the gold that your tiles produce. It doesn't count other revenue streams, such as money from holy shrines or per-turn payments from other civs. It doesn't count gold from specialists, either.

 

[NKVD]

You need to increase your overall commerce. Try building some extra cottages, while they start off small, when they get to towns, particularly in combo with some advances and civics, they can really generate commerce, which will boost both your research and cash flows.

Don

combo of cottages?

 

[Jazz_Newton]

ramp up your difficulty level a bit. You won't have much excess cash lying around at 100% science once you actually have to start paying a realistic amount for things.

 

[Azash]

combo of cottages?

I think he means a combination of cottages, advances and civics.

 

[The Apple]

It's 100% of the gold that your tiles produce. It doesn't count other revenue streams, such as money from holy shrines or per-turn payments from other civs. It doesn't count gold from specialists, either.

Ah-ha! I've been wondering this for a while now. In the game I'm playing now I'm making 45g a turn, even though I have the slider set to spend all my money on research, and untill now I couldn't figure out where the extra money was coming from. The lame financial 'advisor' only listed the income as coming from taxes, but there's no mention of taxes in either the manual or the civilopedia, so I was left wondering.