Money Problems

[ranskaldan]

I'm running into major money problems. I've cranked my science way down below what I want it to be and I'm still losing money at -4 per turn (70ish in total right now). I'm in early Medieval, and the problem was partially caused by a spree of temples and two spearmen in every city.

Basically, I'm losing 50+ every turn from corruption, 20ish in units and 20+ in maintenance. I'm currently on Monarchy with science at 50% to 60%. Many of the other civs are already ahead by 1-2 techs.

Now the thing is, what should I do?

* Republic? - The corruption would be lowered, but the unit maintenance would pose major problems. Also - happiness. Only one luxury so far.

* Marketplaces - do they help in this?

* Temples - should I start selling temples?

* War - would an expansionist policy help? Or would that leave my civ even more vulnerable?

The level is Regent, by the way

[WarpStorm]

Marketplaces will help, as will roads on your worked tiles.

[asleepathewheel]

What civ are you?

If I were you I would:

1. turn science to zero

2. disband unused obsolete units

3. rush marketplaces with the increased taxes (don't build them in totally corrupted cities though)

4. raise science rate back up.

5. are you religious? after you have markets, go to republic

Other points to ponder:

Are there luxuries nearby or unclaimed on an island?
Start a war with a country and seize a city on a luxury. abandon or raze it and plant your own city there.

1-2 techs behind isn't so bad, I've been in much, much worse. course, it depends on the techs

you have knights? Do they have muskets? if no gunpowder, then attack using knights. are you closer to cavs? wait till those. Brute force can usually defeat smaller numbers of better defenders, if you attack en masse. Try to take and hold a spot and either hole up there or attack other cities. get a friend to attack from the other direction and distract.

*don't attack the french if they have musketeers, will trigger their golden age probably and they will be much stronger.

can you not trade for any luxuries?

I usually try to find luxuries on my continent early, then send a settler over to it ASAP, to claim it for later. (and hope its not attacked)

Here's some help, I'm sure there's better advice out there or in the strat forum.

I would advise against selling temples. if you are already having happiness problems, this will only make it worse, though on regent, there is more of a tolerance of citizens.

[vmxa1]

Post a save. I would not sell of my temples. I would look first at my cities to see if I have citizens working on tiles that do not have roads, if so build them. Look at the food box, is it making more than is needed? If so mine, even if it was already irrigated. Do you have lots of workers, do you need them all, are they all yours or some captured? If you can spare a few of yours join them in a city or sell them to save the upkeep. I would think you are negative cash because you have not mined and roaded all the worked tiles that you could have. Often you can save the day by just moving citizens from less productive tiles. The automated workers will make a mess if allowed to, they will mine and road and irrigate tiles that can not be worked, costing you.

[Theseus]

2 Spearmen in every town... sounds like Civ2.

[Demerzel]

marketplaces are absolutely essential, for me I prefer marketplaces over temples & libraries. with the money you make from marketplaces you can always rush the other improvements, the reverse is not true. plus with enough money coming in you can always buy tech from the AIs - this is how you play the game at emperor level & above, once you've contacted a few civs you slap the science rate to 10% and just use all the money coming in to rush useful further money making improvements & buying tech off the superior researching civs.

you don't need two defensive units in each city unless you are using them for the morale bonuses gained by military garrisons. just keep a couple of units in each of your ( important ) border cities and a stockpile reserve behind the front lines of the AI you suspect of being the next aggressor. the interior cities can be garrisoned lightly or not at all if you are feeling confident.

i would recommend going to republic asap, its benefits far outweigh the other government types unless you expect to be waging war a lot ( and are the one starting the fights ).

don't sell any of the temples but try to balance the improvements that soak up your cash reserves with the ones that increase it.

luxuries as mentioned above are very useful especially if you have a monopoly on them, you can easily get 10-20 gold per turn and some I've got 35+

in the early game I often find that I have nearly as many workers as military units, this helps to keep all my cities productive as can be. balancing military & civilian matters is another thing to keep your eye on.

the minimum time to research a tech is four turns. if at 60% science rate a new tech can be researched in that time try reducing to 50% or lower and if the time remains at 4 turns reduce to the lowest setting that keeps the research time at 4 turns, this will ensure that taxes aren't wasted unnecessarily.

a final point but on the same theme as the last, on the final turn of researching, you can often reduce the science rate whilst still maintaining one turn to go for that tech. this sometimes means you go from say 50% science to 20% and on early turns you can go from +20 gpt to +50. On later turns I've gone from +150gpt to +1100gpt which makes a nice difference in your treasury.

heh hope thats useful, easy to wax lyrical with all your favourite tweaks on this kind of thread.

[vmxa1]

It is wise to put markets in, but just be sure you are justified. That means look at the taxes and see what you generate from that city. If you have +2, it is not worth it yet. If more than 2, then do it. You get 50% boost and pay maint of 1. So if you are getting say 4, it will add 2 and that is a profit of 1. Of course it is valuable for happy people as a lux enhancer. But if you are strapped, you want a profit first.