Depends. In general you will lose 2nd ring vs 2nd ring battle on deity every time anyway. Keeping 1st ring is important of course, but monument isn't my first choice. Alternative methods have been mentioned already.
Whether to build monuments.
- Thread starter TruePurple
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Noble Zarkon
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Also you can build a missionary in a stronger city that already has its basic infrastructure up.Religion is also a LOT more useful than only 1/pt.
Alexander IV
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I meant Purple mentioned longtime playing Spiritual Indian who starts with Mysticism. So then why bother monuments, better put somebody on a sacrificial altar asap.
TruePurple
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Why all this mutual exclusion talk? Can't we build monument and library and every other culture giving building for border cities, not only to keep access to tiles but to prevent city flips
Sacrificial alter? I mean indians as in India.
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TP - you can build whatever you wish. Folks here are generally gonna give you advice around optimizing your game, which you can take or leave. My solutions to culture pressure is death
Yes. I mean of course you can just build every providing building in your border cities and see if you can beat the from bordering AI cities. Or you can use those 
to build units, wage war and see AI culture disappear entirely.
, unless an AI city is stealing your tiles. In which case often the best alternatives are either to suck it up or go to war. Paying to gain tiles is often inefficient.
providing building in your border cities and see if you can beat the from bordering AI cities. Or you can use those to build units, wage war and see AI culture disappear entirely.There is no exclusion. It's just that culture matters very little - you need to pop borders once and then you have claimed every tile you are able to work. All it takes is 10
, unless an AI city is stealing your tiles. In which case often the best alternatives are either to suck it up or go to war. Paying to gain tiles is often inefficient.TruePurple
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If for whatever reason you do not want to attack the nation you are bordering, then every bit of culture per turn matters, not just the first 10 both for preventing working tiles from being taken and preventing city flip.
Are you saying this is wrong, and if so how is it wrong?
Are you saying this is wrong, and if so how is it wrong?
TruePurple
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Let's say the other nation is stronger than you, very friendly with you, and a source of tech trade as well as valuable resource trade. You can't think of reasons to not attack? You just spend the whole game attacking every nearby neighbor simultaneously?
soundjata
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This game is like an BOW. The victory being the ARROW that you are shooting on some target of your choice.
Depending on where you want to shoot that arrow, the range of viable tactics varies a lot!
The more you practice the game ; the more you pull the string of the bow to shoot the arrow faster, the more you realize some apparently useful buildings are in fact slowing you down. (Plus this... Multiply that... Ain't that cute indeed?
)
Monuments fall quite often in this category
Depending on where you want to shoot that arrow, the range of viable tactics varies a lot!
The more you practice the game ; the more you pull the string of the bow to shoot the arrow faster, the more you realize some apparently useful buildings are in fact slowing you down. (Plus this... Multiply that... Ain't that cute indeed?
)Monuments fall quite often in this category
Well, why is the other nation stronger? Is it because you are wasting on buildings that provide or some other reason? Who said anything about attacking neighbors simultaneously? You can vassal them one by one and then continue trading.
on buildings that provide or some other reason? Who said anything about attacking neighbors simultaneously? You can vassal them one by one and then continue trading.TruePurple
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Let's please parse the subjects better. For whatever reason I don't wish to attack, then doesn't it make sense to build various culture buildings on a border city for tile claiming and flip prevention?
If that is all you can do, then you must do it. But let's also be clear that in general it's not a situation you want to be in. Why you don't wish to attack is a very relevant topic. Also you shouldn't be overly concerned about losing mediocre tiles. And your strong tiles should be on the 1st ring anyway.
edit: and a library is enough to hold 1st ring.
edit: and a library is enough to hold 1st ring.
TruePurple
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A library is enough to hold a first ring and prevent city flip even if there are a number of nearby high culture opposing cities?
Maybe there are cases where the monument makes a difference between losing a tile or not when the city is already past 10 culture, but these cases might be rarer than you think, and it has a lot to do with the plot culture mechanics I posted above. Growing one "culture radius" (past 10, then past 100) provides +20 culture per turn to all inner rings and that's much more impactful than any non-wonder building.
Depends on what part of the game are you talking about. Like I said earlier, war is the best solution to cultural pressure.
If the library isn't enough, the monument isn't likely to change things.
If the tile you are fighting over is on the outer ring of your culture and the outer ring of the AI's culture, you should probably just assume you're going to lose it against a high-level AI. AIs love building culture buildings (especially when you start trying to amp up cultural pressure against them yourself), and get a hefty discount on the cost of making buildings at higher levels. And they'll even bump up the culture slider or run artist specialists sometimes. Assume an AI city will produce at least a little more culture than your city, unless you are specifically trying to get that city to legendary culture for cultural victory. Trying to beat them at their own game by just "build more culture buildings than them" is a losing proposition - sure, you might be able to do it if you prioritized it heavily enough, but you'd have to dump a ton of hammers into something not all that useful. It would certainly take a lot more than just a library and a monument. You'd need to build theaters, temples, monasteries, wonders.
But that doesn't mean the AI cities will simply run rampant over your culture. If a tile is closer to your city than it is to the AI city, then as long as you can stay on the same cultural tier as their city - both Fledgling 10-99 culture, both Developing 100-500, etc. - your tile culture is getting a hidden under-the-hood 20 culture per turn advantage. It's not your city with 2 culture from a library up against their city. It's your city with 22 culture, 2 from the library and 20 from the interior culture advantage, up against theirs. Adding the monument for 23 culture per turn instead of 22 isn't the big deal. Even if you only spend half the time on culture-tier parity, that's still half the time you're getting an extra 20 per turn; a city with a library can probably fend off an AI city making 8 or 10 culture per turn. Adding a monument occasionally will shift that balance for a specific tile, but not often.
So basically, if an AI city isn't producing boatloads of culture you can probably defend tiles you care about with just a library. And if it is producing boatloads of culture, rather than fight head-on against AIs at something they care far too much about and get far too many built-in advantages trying for why not just get an army and take the city away from them? Problem solved.
