Merchant Republic/Monarchy’s bonus and Government change

[UnknownHuman]

If you swap Marchant Republic or Monarchy, respectively +2 trade routes/+2 housing in cities with medieval walls, do you lose those bonus?

I didn’t want to try in my first game with Cleopatra, so after winning I loaded an old save, swapped Merchant Republic to Democracy and I still had my two trade routes but I was over the limite (15/13).

But since I was too lazy to wait for one of my trade routes to be pillaged or to be renewed I don’t know if the extra ones disappear, I guess they do when pillaged but it’d be odd when renewed, and how does it work for medieval walls?

 

[Lord Shadow]

I'm fairly sure you lose most of the bonuses.

What you don't lose is the legacy bonus, as far as I know, which you accumulate the longer you stay on that government type. If I remember correctly, for Monarchy it's +X% influence gain (with city-states), and -X% construction purchase cost for Merchant Republic.

 

[Browd]

Lord Shadow is correct.

As for what happens to existing over-the-limit trade routes when you switch out of Merchant Republic, the trade routes will continue until the trade routes expire -- you will not be able to renew those expiring trade routes until you are back down to your new limit.

Just put those extra trade units to sleep -- you will need them later when you build more commercial hubs and harbors, unlocking additional trade route capacity (when that happens you won't have to build new trade units -- just wake up your stored units and put them to work). As you note, they are also useful to keep in storage for when other trade units are pillaged -- you can replace the pillaged route the very next turn.

 

[UnknownHuman]

Ok thanks, so depending on the situation I guess it’s better to keep tier 2 governments, particularly if you’ve extra slots from wonders.

 

[Lord Shadow]

I don't think extra policy slots from wonders would go away if you changed government.

 

[UnknownHuman]

I don't think extra policy slots from wonders would go away if you changed government.

No they don't, but they’ll offset for the policy slots you would have gained from tier 3 government, so if you make the right wonders you can have a tier 2 government with the same number of slots than a tier 3 one.

 

[TheMarshmallowBear]

No they don't, but they’ll offset for the policy slots you would have gained from tier 3 government, so if you make the right wonders you can have a tier 2 government with the same number of slots than a tier 3 one.

But they add onto Tier 3. So you have more slots?

You do realise that right

 

[Browd]

Yes, those wonders that give additional slots will allow you to make a tier 2 government look somewhat like a tier 3 government (but not really), or you can have a real tier 3 government that is extra powerful. In my opinion, unless you are a few turns away from getting another level of legacy bonus from your tier 2 government (where delaying a few turns may be beneficial), you should switch to tier 3 as soon as you are able.

 

[glaivemaster]

I think the point is, if you like the bonuses from a Tier 2 government more than those of a Tier 3 one, then sometimes you won't want to upgrade (Theocracy comes strongly to mind).

All Unkown Human was saying with the wonders is that it offsets the pain of having less slots, because you still have a couple more than usual (even if upgrading would give you even more more)