[R&F] tall vs wide
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If you want to go tall, I'd say the sweet spot is 7 now because of Audience Chamber and 7 governors. You can certainly squeeze in a few more though because you can rotate governors and let a few more cities go tall this way. Since R&F it's certainly more powerful, especially if you use the extra hammers (from less focus on settlers) in early game to go for a religion or setup nice combos like Oracle/Pingala. Flipping cities also becomes a lot easier because of high pressure from population.
Primacide
Settler
Yeah it's hard to break the tall habit, but generally speaking if you see an amenity, you should plop a city next to it. There's not much in the way of downside.
Tall isnt viable in civ 6. Even at max amenities, thats what, a 10% bonus to yields? Meh. Considering that tech/civic cost no longer scales with number of cities either, the game pretty much forces you to spam as many cities as possible.
At 4 cities vs 6, the player with 6 will sigificantly out tech the player with 4.
Fewer cities also causes you to run out fo space very quickly for districts/wonders especially with the huge restrictions on wonder placements.
To try and make tall more viable i made all resources apply to 6 cities max and created two new happiness levels, so that the top one gives 25% yields at +7 amenities.
At 4 cities vs 6, the player with 6 will sigificantly out tech the player with 4.
Fewer cities also causes you to run out fo space very quickly for districts/wonders especially with the huge restrictions on wonder placements.
To try and make tall more viable i made all resources apply to 6 cities max and created two new happiness levels, so that the top one gives 25% yields at +7 amenities.
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You can win an OCC challenge on deity so of course you can play with 3 cities but you have to understand that it’s harder.
You can go to 100 cities with few penalties
The answer is it depends on victory condition, map, difficulty, opposition, civ and luck.
One key thing to understand is the cost of districts goes up with the techs/civics you have and so typically you do not make many cities after turn 100. Getting as many before then normally is very helpful. Spending too much time expanding can also slow you down.
Often taking enemy cities helps your cause by reducing their culture, religion and general power.
You can go to 100 cities with few penalties
The answer is it depends on victory condition, map, difficulty, opposition, civ and luck.
One key thing to understand is the cost of districts goes up with the techs/civics you have and so typically you do not make many cities after turn 100. Getting as many before then normally is very helpful. Spending too much time expanding can also slow you down.
Often taking enemy cities helps your cause by reducing their culture, religion and general power.
What? Is this CIV5?
With the way district discounts work, you can still get dirt cheap districts after turn 100. If you get too many cities early on with no infrastructure and place all your districts immediately, you'll shoot yourself in the foot because all discounts will be gone. With a "taller" strategy, you can focus on infrastructure instead, build districts faster and unlock district discounts for new cities.
Edit: Don't get me wrong, early wide city spam works well depending on the map. But going tall is a very different game and settling cities after turn 100 is very beneficial if you start with less cities but more districts and possibly a religion even.
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... so you are saying that district discounts of a few districts is more efficient than pre placing?
There have been many threads about it being pointless to build cities after T100 which I disagree with but your key cities need to be in place by then unless you are playing longer than T200.
The strategy of a 2 phase empire I used to play well over a year ago where you build a few key cities, get them working then expand in a second phase just does not work as well.
One of the important things is population, as a city grows in size it takes longer for a new pop. More cities earlier just works..
I don't know. I'm not sitting here with a pen and make notes every turn.
I like to play peacefully as much as I can and just share what works for me. I don't restart until I can spam cities and win on T200.Growing cities to size 10 isn't much of a problem with Audience Chamber and harvesting jungles/marsh etc.
If done carefully, district spam means that only your first 2 districts aren't discounted and then only one district of your choosing, probably campus most of the time. The rest will be discounted almost through the entire game. So basically you only pre-place one type of district. Obviously, civs with a unique district have an easy choice there. Japan, Germany, Russia and Korea are arguably the best civs for this district spam. Followed by Greece and England.
If you want to play peacefully, it's pretty awesome. The 2nd expansion wave can be optimized by getting a religion which guarantees the medieval golden age on turn 88 (most of the time on Deity). Rush Feudalism and faith buy buffed builders and settlers.
Or ignore religion and get more trade routes and campuses instead. Works both. With a religion, you'll have better infrastructure, less science and more culture but you can catch up with insane Moksha Apostles and get +1 science per religious follower in foreign cities.
Edit:
Just had my fastest win with this strategy. Germany, Deity, standard. Peaceful science victory on turn 221 although I was too lazy and tired to really optimize the late game. For example I forgot to rushbuy the space port with Reyna although I had the promotion.
I only had 7 cities on turn 100 but had another big wave of settlers during the renaissance golden age with Hic Sunt Dracones. Around 100 districts and 20 cities in the end
Here's the graph of total districts constructed.
:Spoiler :
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Lee Duane Fitzsimmons
Full-time Cat Lover
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I have always built tall, but I prefer tall and wide... 
However, that option isn't feasible all the time, unless,,,
unless you don't have a lot of pesky neighbors.
However, that option isn't feasible all the time, unless,,,
unless you don't have a lot of pesky neighbors.
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.. that means you are limited with what you can research also to stop having too many district types?
Esperr
King
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Yeah im pretty sure in the other thread we figured out that trying to hit discounts isn't worth going out of your way for.
Yes, you are unfortunately. The holy site, harbor and encampment are the best candidates for a delay. In coastal cities you might want to build another district first. With a religious start and two early holy sites, research is slow enough to also delay CHs and IZs a little longer.
Delaying encampments is a problem in jungle heavy areas. It's very map dependant I guess.
Also, the statement you quoted is too exaggerated for most situations and civs without unique districts. After more tests, I think it's best to pick one type of district that you pre-place regardless of discounts. I'm currently playing around with the idea of using Liangs -30% and the -25% pantheon for this. Speed is important as well as growing tall or wide, ideally both.
Overall, the most important thing is the initial setup. Your first two districts have to be of the same type and you need them quickly. That's what gets the ball rolling.
This begs a related question. How are folks using the diplomacy specialist governor? Absent a crisis that makes you put her in your own city to boost Loyalty or in a CS city to block/gain suzerainty, how are you generally using her and how much of a priority is she when you are selecting governors?
Of course, pesky neighbor cities are excellent prospects for widening your realm and eventually making them tall.I have always built tall, but I prefer tall and wide...
However, that option isn't feasible all the time, unless,,,
unless you don't have a lot of pesky neighbors.
Also not bad for Rome, since Legions don't need Iron. You still have to tech up sooner or later to build legions, but you can skip the tedious steps of settling near iron (if you aren't lucky enough to be there already) and creating a mine.
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She can be useful for that first envoy or suzerain and the era points that go with it but Magnus and Liang I tend to select first, also Magnus and provision promotion before Liang.
For emergency situations... they should not really happen much and if so should be planned for, we know how loyalty works so there is no excuse for suddenly realising you are in trouble and need a governor fast.
However these situations do arise because I play too fast or change my mind and in these situations if Amani is in a place that is more valuable than say Liang, I will use Liang, that’s fairly normal for me, the extra charge is normally not as much value.
I have used a governor to help with Loyalty in a conquered city, especially early, when I want to keep my units moving toward the next target.
Having said that, I'm not sure that I understand the Loyalty mechanics and the best way to manage them as well as I should. Any pointers are welcome.
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On a city you tap on the left side and get a little loyalty bar up, but if you tap on that you get a better detail screen up including for enemy cities. You can see 4 sections for a city, pressure, governors, amenities and other. Only pressure counts against other cities, things like governors do not.
The best defence against external pressure is increasing your population, one or two extra pop can be the same value as a governor. It just depends on the numbers so a 2 pop city 5 tiles away only exerts 50% of each so is equal to one of your pop.
Low loyalty cities will not grow easily is an issue and as a taken city only starts at 50% loyalty it can be tricky. The point is if there is 3 enemy cities in front of you if you take 1 it’s going to rebel in 5 turns so you have roughly that long to take the next city, if you think it’s going to take 7 turns maybe you add a governor or let it flip... but letting it flip will in about another 5 turns flip back to the original owner as it’s based on accumulated loyalty. Once you have 2 cities they may still be pulsing but will exert some pressure on each other so should give more time to take the third. Normally 3 cities should help each other enough as long as there is not a huge city very close.
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