Infrastructure

[Frossa]

Just out of curiosity, does anybody ever upgrade their roads to railroads upon discovering the tech? I find the high maintenance cost too discouraging to take advantage of railroads as much as normal roads, unless it's a really short distance. I really wish you could keep building normal roads even after discovering Railroad, or the maintenance of railroads would be reduced.
Does anybody agree, or have any other thoughts?

 

[Browd]

You can keep building normal roads after researching railroads (the icons are slightly different). The 25% production boost in non-capital cities can make a big difference, but only larger cities make sense to connect. Speed in moving units to the front (if you are militarily inclined) can also be significant.

 

[Unresolved]

I only build railroads in science games. You don't need production for diplomatic victories. You only need production in your capital for culture games. Immortal domination games are over before railroads would have any great effect.

 

[mintcandy]

You can keep building normal roads after researching railroads (the icons are slightly different).

Agree, you CAN still build regular roads after researching railroads.

Since I prefer to use hotkeys, and because the hotkey for regular roads is different than the hotkey for railroads, it becomes easy to maintain using normal roads.

 

[xnira]

I think the production bonus was in the city that was connected to the capitol and not the capitol itself. Then again I could be wrong...

 

[cpm4001]

It's a toss-up for me. If I'm pulling in enough gold to be able to afford the increased maintenance costs I'll replace almost all my roads with railroads; otherwise I'll just keep 'em as roads.

 

[Wodan]

Keep in mind that you can devote cities to convert production to gold. 25% increase of a sizable city with even medium production more than pays for the railroads for a good number of cities.

And, if you find that you want all your cities to be making buildings, consider that you're getting the benefit from those buildings 25% faster. Do the math: compute the number of turns to crank out that Research Lab (or whatever) and divide by 4 (which is 25%, to get the # of turns saved), then multiply by (the income per turn from that city plus 4) and multiply by 1.5 (the Research Lab benefit) to get the bonus you are cranking in. congratulations, you've just converted to at a really good conversion rate.

/Civ5 isn't like 4, when you could just crank the slider. It's more difficult to convert to research, so when we can it's usually a good idea.

 

[Frossa]

Well, now I have some insight. Thank you all

 

[Fluffball]

I tend to only connect my production cities and if my empire is quite large i often build RR on a trunk road to the edges on my empire to move units around quickly.

 

[pilot00]

You can keep building normal roads after researching railroads (the icons are slightly different). The 25% production boost in non-capital cities can make a big difference, but only larger cities make sense to connect. Speed in moving units to the front (if you are militarily inclined) can also be significant.

This one above, however I connect all my cities. By the time money should not be a problem, production always is a problem. You can never churn out buildings/units in a satisfactory speed IMHO.

 

[Browd]

I think the production bonus was in the city that was connected to the capitol and not the capitol itself. Then again I could be wrong...

You are correct. Capital never gets RR bonus (which is stupid, but that's the way it works).

 

[joncnunn]

Personally I always upgrade my road connections to rail connections. In fact since Rails arrive so late, I often have workers with nothing to do waiting for the tech with plans to disband most of them as soon as the rail lines are completed.

 

[BrokTheFanatic]

Personally I always upgrade my road connections to rail connections. In fact since Rails arrive so late, I often have workers with nothing to do waiting for the tech with plans to disband most of them as soon as the rail lines are completed.

Same. May not do all my roads but most and will always railroad to support any attack/offensive. And disbanding workers frees up a bit of gold, definitely don't need all that many by that point in the game.

 

[Maxym]

Definitely do railroads to core cities, sometimes anticipating a city to have a high production potential and then put ironworks there and RR plus other associated bonuses can result in awesome production, like one turn SS parts

 

[scheva007]

You've got workers idle by that time anyway, waiting to discover uranium. migt as well use them. railroads are so beneficial (production and speed bonus), that i cant imagine not laying them. They are suitale for every victory, cause you get a building (a research lab, a broadcast tower, etc..) 25% faster

 

[Ranos]

I connect all my cities with railroads. My major cities get the production boost so I can support the wars, wonder building or space ship building for whichever victory I'm going for. My lesser cities get the production boost so they can complete the buildings I need to help my empire or support the gold production that I've switched them over to. It also allows for faster troop movement in case I'm attacked.

The only reason I don't upgrade is if I'm having gold problems. And if I'm having that problem then the game is probably already lost or will be soon so it doesn't really matter.

 

[Wodan]

I generally RR all cities on the main continent only, with one exception if I'm Carthage.

Carthage (free Harbors) is just so easy to run without not just RRs, but without any roads at all.