Government Imbalance?

Smallpox vs. largepox, gen2 vs gen5, early war vs. peaceful alliances. Which is your favourite gaming style?
cwf1986
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Government Imbalance?

Post by cwf1986 »

I see great value in Monarchy early in the game. It's great for the initial expansion of the empire since settlers only take one food and taking out neighbors that are too close who's land you want. It's also nice to build cheap units for happiness and not suffer a production penalty for building units for those small undeveloped cities. It's also a good chance to build happiness improvements while preparing for Republic and the rapturing that'll grow the cities under it.

After that initial expansion phase and most cities are size 3 and you have some happiness improvements, republic becomes awsome because of the rapturing of cities with luxuries crazy high, then you can go for money to buy economic improvements which also increase luxury output than change tax rates for science. With the high trade of republic, the luxury output of a smaller percentage is worth a lot more than under Monarchy or Communism. Also, you can respond on the fly a lot easier because you can get a huge cashflow if you change up your tax rates.

Even if you're at war under democracy and republic, if you have a happiness wonder or two and you put the luxuries up a little higher, you still make more money and science than in communism it seems like. And you can buy happiness improvements in the new cities you take and buy units too with the cash flow to keep them. And once you can build police stations or build woman's suffrage, democracy has all the bennys of republic and more except for the revolt thing!

Also, since units in republic/democracy cost production you don't want every city to have a zillion units, but because of the money you can react to situations very quickly, even more so if you have railroads connecting cities so you don't have to.


I guess the question is, how do you play a solid game under a communism? For tech, I guess you could steal tech with vet spies but you'll never get ahead. It seems like if you just think things out a little even in war, republic and democracy still give advantages in war that communism doesn't provide. Namely the cash flow and with that the ability to respond quickly to changing military situations.

Is this gameplay imbalance or do I just not know how to play a good game with communism?
cazfi
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Re: Government Imbalance?

Post by cazfi »

Communism has the benefits of high martial law (you get 6 more content people without happiness buildings), does not suffer from military unhappiness, free upkeep for three units. Sure Democracy will win peaceful game, but there's no way it can stop aggressively played communism. While railroads allow you to move units "quickly", it still takes one turn, and in one turn Communism can take many cities with weaker defense.
In our multiplayer games the problem is that Communism always wins, the balance issue is completely opposite to what you're experiencing (do you play singleplayer? Against AI players Democracy is probably better, as AI is not good enough to play Communism properly against you before you get the science lead)
cwf1986
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Re: Government Imbalance?

Post by cwf1986 »

If you have a moment, could you tell me how your communism strategy works?

It just seems like it would take forever to build units for conquest without the cashflow to just buy them.
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Nimrod
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Re: Government Imbalance?

Post by Nimrod »

The missing piece of your puzzle here is the fact that you haven't taken into account Rapture under Communism. That's the key. Try it out in your single player games against the AI. You will find that your money problems go away pretty quickly :)
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Arbogast
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Re: Government Imbalance?

Post by Arbogast »

I have a similar problem.
I Play against AIs AND Communism. But i seldom get to rapture. So:
Temples and Coliseums or Banks and Stock markets?
And/or how much Luxury?
I mean: I get a good start, even if I lag behind in the first 100 turns, then I catch up in the next 50 turns but by then I'm way behind in the Tech Tree. So...
(This is an interesting topic for those who play alone)
cazfi
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Re: Government Imbalance?

Post by cazfi »

Note that most happiness affecting buildings do either unhappy->content or content->happy conversion, but not the other kind. Under communism you already make 6 people content by having 3 military units upholding martial law, so even Temples are needed in really big cities only. Happiness is harder to get (and you need that for rapture). Happiness providing wonders are valuable.
cwf1986
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Re: Government Imbalance?

Post by cwf1986 »

I'm having a ton of trouble getting a practical rapture in my cities under communism. I build all the happiness improvements I can and have a happiness wonder, but all they do is make uncontents content. So I have to set up luxuries higher to make cities rapture. But by the time I set up luxuries high enough to make cities rapture, I losing so much money through luxuries that it doesn't matter that every gold producing square makes one more gold. How are ya'll doing it?
cazfi
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Re: Government Imbalance?

Post by cazfi »

In any case the big money comes from good traderoutes, making tile based income somewhat insignificant, and Rep/Dem are better than Com in tile based trade only.
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Arbogast
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Re: Government Imbalance?

Post by Arbogast »

don't forget to push the luxury way up. It works in any government.
rainbowrobin
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Re: Government Imbalance?

Post by rainbowrobin »

Sure, pushing it up puts you into Rapture, but it's not obvious that the trade gains from being in Rapture outweigh the tax/science losses from having such a high luxury rate. Certainly when I've tried it under Monarchy it didn't seem worthwhile.
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