what is the use of a capital city?

[sav]

in my current game as the english (emperor, 4 civs, small map, restless tribes), after a 65 year war with the russians where no cities were lost, we made peace. five years later, while im in the midst of a revolution, war breaks out again, and i lose my capital - - i was offered to move it to another city for $1000, i declined - the $1800 i'd saved so far was to be used to buy their city containing Leonardo's Workshop. So I have no capital city, right? I then use some of that money to buy back my original capital, and note the palace has been destroyed, leaving me capital-less. The revolution finishes, and i switch to Democracy. Peace breaks out.

BUT - I dont seem to have any problems as far as income or happiness or anything goes - its just like a normal democracy, yet I dont have a capital. Sooooo... what is the advantage of having one, or the disadvantage of not having one? Is there something im missing?

 

[History_Buff]

Its just because you are using democracy, which eliminates corruption and waste. in any other system it would be horifying.

 

[duke o' york]

The capital cannot be bribed, which is not that important against the AI, but useful against those lowdown human players. The palace also represents the launch site for your spaceship so if someone takes your capital while you have a spaceship en route to Alpha Centauri and you can't afford to buy another one instantly then your ship crashes and burns and you have to build a new one. Of course, under democracy, you don't need a capital to reduce corruption so you can sell your palace before you start to build the SS and then it can never be destroyed.

 

[Ren]

Hmmm, I didn't think you could sell your palace

 

[duke o' york]

Yeah, that was irresponsible of me as I have never bothered to do it myself (my capital is impregnable ) and was only passing on what I'd read here. I'll have to check it at some point.

 

[Duke of Marlbrough]

You can't sell your palace, but you can starve the city down to one person and then build a settler to disband it and then your spaceship will be impervious.

 

[duke o' york]

That's it! I knew that there was some capital naughtiness so your SS wouldn't capitulate until your civ did!

 

[sav]

cool, thanks everyone. its a pity hardly any of my games actually reach the spaceship stage - the version i play on (playstation) slows right down once you get into the 14-1500's, and gets so frustrating i usually quit and start again but i do remember the smashing-capital-to-stop-spaceship tactics from my days playing CIVone... so it seems under a democracy its almost an advantage to not have a capital - are any governments out there listening?