Is it better to amass a large army just before Communism or after?

[The Tyrant]

In my games I'll usually have two good expansion wars before researching Communism. After the second one the distance factor in city upkeep costs pretty much makes further expansion counter-productive. Once I disover Communism and can switch to State Property my neighbors wake up one morning and find my troops garrisoning their cities. I'm not sure I've been timing the pre-war buildup properly, though.

When I can see I'm a couple of techs away from researching Communism I'll start to ramp up my military. The sudden spike in my power graph is clear and it doesn't slow at all. Then, when I've finally researched and swithced civics all bets are off. Recently I've been wondering if I'm doing things in the right order.

The pre-discovery ramp up means that I'm paying ever increasing unit upkeep costs at a time where my outer cities are still costing me a lot in upkeep. In other words, I'm reducing my funds (and therefore my research percentage) at a time when money is already tight. Having to reduce the tech slider to support those troops means it takes slightly longer to reach the discovery and means paying that upkeep for that many extra turns.

Assuming I have a strong enough military to deter invasion, and considering only the costs of the army I'll be building to invade others with: Should I first go all-out research, allowing me to discover/switch civics earlier, and then build the invasion force? That would allow me to free up more money earlier from reduced city upkeep costs and building the army later means less years spent paying extra unit upkeep. The anticipation of the inevitable expansion wars makes it fun to pre-build the armies, but I'm wondering if it might make more strategic/financial sense to hold off.

 

[PieceOfMind]

Here are my thoughts.
I don't know about you, but usually in my games the unit costs aren't really that significant when compared to other costs, meaning I don't mind building up my military. Perhaps you're talking about such a large force that you significantly affect your research.

I think it'd be a good idea to build up your military as you wrote, as long as you don't let it sit around for hundreds of turns costing you a fortune for no benefit. Obviously this is not the case for you, and you use the military build up to your advantage - taking down enemies. For this reason, I think the build-up is well worth the increased costs. I think every single unit you own is worth its upkeep - the more power you have the better.
The only time I worry about units costs is when I have a stack of obsolete units scattered about, where disbanding them nets me 10 or so extra gold each turn.

By using the term "pre-building" your armies, I assume you don't mean putting shields towards them until they're almost complete - this is how the term is often used.

Because you're getting Fascism you'll also be given the opportunity to build the Kremlin. I'm not sure whether you already do this but make sure you get your hands on the Kremlin. Then start using your production cities to buy units rather than build them (because production bonuses are included when rushing). Using this technique, your pre-war phase could consist of building up a cash reserve so that as soon as you get the Kremlin you start pouring the units out. I think this would be slightly more efficient than building the units before the Kremlin. Before you build the Kremlin you could focus on building some banks/markets etc. and building some new cottages here and there. A wealthy nation is a powerful nation (through rush-buying). Obviously for this technique you need to use Universal Suffrage.

Personally, I'd avise holding off on your military-push until you get the Kremlin. Before then, you'll obviously still be producing units (in your production centres) but not on a mass scale. If you don't use the cash-rushing with Universal Suffrage, then I'd isntead advise building up your military as soon as possible, as I said earlier, even before you get State Property.

 

[sgrig]

I would agree with PieceofMind that possibly the most effective way of building up an army quickly is through rush-buying it with the Kremlin. This way each of your cities can produce a unit in two turns. So if you have 20 cities say, within 4 turns you can produce 40 units (assuming you've got the cash). Moreover, while building the Kremlin you could research even more and build more advanced units than if building units for a long time before getting Communism.

 

[The Tyrant]

Thanks, folks. Those are some good points. I guess it doesn't hurt so much to amass an army before State Property frees up more money, but I'll use your tips to reduce the amount of units I build long before. And yes, when I reach this stage, the unit upkeep gets substantial. "In overkill I trust." I like what both of you pointed out about the Kremlin. I've been using it, but probably not to its best advantage. That change alone should let me either go to war earlier or, if around the same time frame as before, with an even larger and more modern military.