Prince level- financial difficulties

[Leeksoup]

Hi everyone. After making that Monarch thread a while back, I realized two things. First, I was not ready for Monarch. Two, Ramesses doesn't work for me.

Now here I am, with the Incas, and I feel I am almost ready for Monarch. I haven't actually won a game yet, but that's just because I get to the modern age and get bored micromanaging all the stuff.

I have one last thing that could potentially cause me some trouble. How do the good players manage the gold? I seem to be constantly broke. In most of the strategies I've read, REXing seems to be the route to go. I agree with this in theory. But my issue is that after my Quechua rush to take out my nearest neighbor, I'm already in the red. I set up another city, I'm even further in debt. Soon, my "hut-popping" gold is exhausted, and just from three cities my research plummets to 70%. Keeping my research at or above 60%, my economy allows me to have four cities in 500 BC, and almost no army. I'm lucky Huayna is IND, or else I'd have serious issues with barbs (I build the Great Wall).

By the time my economy is back into shape for my fifth city, nine times out of ten my AI opponents have stolen all the land around me, leaving me with nowhere to settle. On Prince, I can handle this, sort of. I put together the best army that I can afford, often leaving my cities undefended, conquer a few neighboring cities and demanding gold for peace. Of course, those cities add almost nothing to me because of the culture from my enemy and their maintenance sucks me dry even faster, so for almost the rest of the game I have to do this balancing act of keeping enough war going and gold coming in to pay for my military and research while preventing an AI dogpile on my defenseless cities.

Like I said, on Prince I can win like that, even if it's pretty close most of the time. But my experience with Monarch tells me that's not going to be good enough. I have a small issue keeping enough workers up, but I always have about one worker per city. I always beeline CoL, getting courthouses and more often then not Confucianism (even if I have the hardest time popping a Great Prophet for its shrine). I don't really know what else to do, and I haven't the slightest idea to how some people get 6-7 cities on freaking Emperor by 1000 BC. Any help would be welcome.

 

[qwertz]

If you stop expanding when your slider drops to 70%, it isn't really REXing. Just keep expanding and don't let the slider position hold you off. As long as you aren't running deficit at 0% research, everything is OK. Once you build some basic infrastructure and your economy gets going, those new cities will easily make up for their maintenance. Also expanding towards the AI and backfilling the rest later can be helpfull.

Remember that the position of the slider doesn't really matter. Only your total research is important.

 

[CivMcNut]

You might want to look at which tiles are being worked in your cities, especially your capital. If you have a gold/gem/or silver mine that can be worked then that can give you the commerce that a mid-game town would. If your workers are focused on soley cranking out hammers and food in your bigger cities, then your empire will have a hard time teching and growing rich.

I usually try to take out an early neighbor of mine in the classical age that would be competeing with me otherwise for expansion. Usually in doing so my economy goes deep into the red, and I have to turn my science slider down to 30 or 40 % about the time I am done fighting this early war. Once your courthouses all come online, the money usually starts coming back in at 60% science rate. Researching currency, calendar, and monarchy(if no pyramids) all help a lot too, having larger functioning cities(due to better happiness) with an extra trade route keeps more money rolling in.

 

[Bleys]

Oracle-CoL slingshot isnt all that difficult, even on Emperor and Immortal. This would allow you to go into Caste System and run a few Merchant Specialists for extra cash.

Also, GPs can be much more valuable settled early. Once your religion spreads, you can use another GP later to build a shrine, but early, the shrine isnt going to produce as much income as a settled GP will.

 

[Refar]

And - just in case DaveMcW should miss this one thread - More Cottages.
Playing a FIN leader the capital has to be cottaged (and those cottages worked for growth) as fast as you can. This usually means well before your 4-th city...

 

[madscientist]

Suggestions;

1) HC is the best to learn Monarch on, Liz next best. All arguments aside, HC get's you more flexibility early while Liz takes awhile to flaunt her Philosophical side.
2) My classic tech path for HC: Polytheism for the early religion! You already have agriculture for farms. Note, hit fihing first if you have a seafood heavy capital.
3) Delay archery. HC is the only leader that I would say this with, simply put those Quencha are great defender against Barb archers.


Now how to claim good land?

Try to block off the AI by claiming good land. This involves having a good distance between the capital and city #2, but worth it. Also you need to prioritize a few workers and get pottery ASAP to start cottaging. Build Quenchas for defense.
Once you block the AI off, wait until you can support more cities, for HC I would start a new settler at 60% science, do not worry if a new city brings you ro say 30% science, it will pop up eventually.

Tagrte writing fairly early, say after BW and AH for the military and build a library in the capital. Run 2 scientists to elevate the tech pace.

You should target Currency and CoL.

Wonders, it's easy to abuse this with HC but don't kill yourself over it. I just played a map with him where I was alone on a land mass in an archeopolego map, and could build 6 cities easy. I focused alot on wonder there, but he is not all about wonders.

Oracle is very valuable for HC and I always suggest the metal casting slingshot for early procution with those cheap forges, plus a great shot at the collosus (4 comemrce per sea tile, that will help the economy).

Good luck.

 

[BalbanesBeoulve]

If you want to expand rapidly, you need money coming in from the very beginning. When given the chance I always plant cities next to a river, in addition to being able to build levees with steam power, any riverside cottages you put down will give you 3 commerce from the very beginning if you're financial, which I always am. Get every new city working at least 1 cottage asap and you should have no problem expanding quickly.

Also it may be tempting to start your 2nd city far away to block off some land or grab some resource, but the distance maintenance costs will kill you. You'll also be tempted to keep your borders closed so the AI's don't settle the land, but this is also bad. Keeping closed borders severely limits your trade route income, can be pretty significant.

I've found it's better to just plant all your cities close to the capital and just fan out from there. And don't be afraid of a little overlap, if there's a good spot just 3 spaces away from my capital, i'll plant my city there. Your capital won't get to size 20 until the late game anyway.

 

[futurehermit]

yep, build more cottages. can't believe davemcw hasn't been here yet