30-04-2005 15:25									#1
	Governments: Which one is best for our Horde Support Apolyton, buy Civilization: The Boardgame

We live in a very dangerous world. There are hostile tribes all around us. And I am not talking about barbarians here.

So, being strong is the only way to survive. If their military advisor tells them they are weak compared to us, they will think twice before attacking. If our military remains strong, we will be desired as allies by everybody. Nobody will dare provoke us so we will be in a unique position to strike where we please and when we please. This will allow us to single out and destroy all of our enemies one by one.


The current situation is such that we are the strongest power on Earth. How can we maintain this edge?

First, if we have decided to be the strongest military till the end, and to deal with our problems militarily, we must keep building units to maintain the kind of military supremacy we currently enjoy. On this front there can be no compromise. No temples, libraries and such unless absolutely necessary and that is to catch a resource or something, not to increase culture and look nice. No granaries, aqueducts unless incredibly advantageous for that city (like a city we dedicated for wonder building). Only one harbour.

Second, and the subject of this thread – the Government of our choice. Off course, the best government for this kind of play is Fascism. The close second best is Communism. With their high unit support figures and pop rushing method, these governments are best poised for large militaries. They are however not within reach.

So, we should discuss Despotism, Republic, Monarchy and Feudalism here.

Last edited by Ljube on 30-04-2005 at 16:20

	30-04-2005 15:26									#2
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Despotism has production penalties, only 2 units as military police and greater corruption than all other governments. However, despotism has pop rushing method and high unit support – 4 units per city regardless of its size. This is particularly advantageous as we will usually work more forests and mines than flood plains which produce no shields.

Republic has no production penalties and much less corruption. In addition to this republic gives increased commerce which is good for money. Also, rush method for republic is pay rather than pop rush which is also good in view of the increased tax generation. However, republican towns (cities smaller than size 6) support only 1 unit for free while each unit after this limit cost TWO gold to support. This particular feature coupled with war weariness and our lack of luxuries is a factor that eliminates republic as government of our choice.

Monarchy has no production penalties and less corruption than despotism. However unit support in monarchy depends on the size of cities. Monarchy is good for larger empires with bigger cities, which our empire is not. A change to monarchy right now would severely hamper our ability to build more units. For that reason I must advise against monarchy for now.

Feudalism is best suited for empires that have small cities. All our cities are less than size 5 and are not likely to grow. With despotism each our city can support 4 units. With feudalism each our small town could support 5 units and in addition would experience no production penalties. This will allow us proper exploitation of mines in our hills and much more food generated from our irrigated specials. The reduced corruption will increase commerce and thus tax collection. The only drawback is slight war weariness. I know war weariness is no small issue, so I think we should ponder about this very carefully. I am opening this thread for discussion.

Last edited by Ljube on 30-04-2005 at 16:20

	05-05-2005 13:28									#3
	Re: Governments: Which one is best for our Horde Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

quote: Originally posted by Ljube-ljcvetko The current situation is such that we are the strongest power on Earth. How can we maintain this edge? First, if we have decided to be the strongest military till the end, and to deal with our problems militarily, we must keep building units to maintain the kind of military supremacy we currently enjoy. On this front there can be no compromise. No temples, libraries and such unless absolutely necessary and that is to catch a resource or something, not to increase culture and look nice. No granaries, aqueducts unless incredibly advantageous for that city (like a city we dedicated for wonder building). Only one harbour. Second, and the subject of this thread – the Government of our choice. Off course, the best government for this kind of play is Fascism. The close second best is Communism. With their high unit support figures and pop rushing method, these governments are best poised for large militaries. They are however not within reach.

good we must retain our strength

	07-05-2005 06:34									#4
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Blood Oath Horde

Feud Hath Fury

I like the pursuance of Feudalism as our govt

Sage of the Horde

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	09-05-2005 09:57									#5
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I know that Feudalism 'looks' good on paper. The problem is how it actually plays out. We have many cities on rivers. These cities have FREE aqueducts (thus they will go >6 unless we purposely keep them lower). Additionally, we are likely to place our dye cities either next to the lake or on the rivers. This means that we would face a micromanagement nightmare of Biblical proportions in order to keep our army from eating our treasury.

In addition, although Fascism ostensibly seems to be the best government for conquest, this is actually proven untrue. The SUPERHUGE advantage of universal corruption (from Communism) makes all other governments pale in comparison (including Democracy!) once you get past the optimum city level. That level in this small-map, emperor-level game is 13.6 cities. For Fascism, what this means in practical terms is that all cities conquered by us that are a significant distance away will produce virtually nothing. In Fascism it is even worse as the cities will also lose population upon conquest (due to xenophobia) and then will not gain any culture until our own population outnumbers the conquered.

Getting back to Monarchy or Feudalism. Feudalism gives 5 support per town, 2 per city, 1 per Metropolis. However: IT COSTS 3 gpt for every additional soldier!!! Monarchy has the 2/4/8 support sequence and costs only 1gpt for each additional unit. If we were in the plains and did not have a river running through our territory (and we have 2 rivers!) then Feudalism might be a legitimate option. In our case, Feudalism requires that we move to the next era (as the tech is required in order to switch to the government) thus leaving us in Despotism (and tile penalty) for a much, much longer time. If we want to switch to Monarchy, we can research the tech in about 18 turns (we think...might take 19 if we get somewhat unlucky) and then immediately switch. This tends to be beneficial as the quantity of cities you have determines the length of anarchy you suffer. I don't know the exact ratio, but fewer cities tends to give less anarchy. If we waited for Feudalism before we switched, we would likely face 5-8 turns of anarchy instead of (probably) 3-6 turns of anarchy.

Since we 1. would suffer no war weariness, 2. would have no limitation on how many cities got >6 (in fact we would prefer them), 3. would have no tile penalty, and 4. could use up to 3 mp's (Feudalism also allows 3 mp's, Despotism only allows 2 mp's): I highly recommend that we research and switch to Monarchy. The other advantage of staying in Monarchy (assuming we would otherwise switch twice to get rid of the tile penalty) is that we would have only 1 period of anarchy.

	09-05-2005 11:19									#6
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Monarchy is the best way to go in my opinion !!!

	09-05-2005 16:51									#7
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I like monarchy s well. Very good for this game.

	09-05-2005 17:20									#8
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Very good analysis of Rcoutme2, monarchy seems the way to go. When and only when we have enough big cities, but with our large supply of river and free luxuries from the pigs. This shouldnt take to long.

	09-05-2005 18:42									#9
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Rob's analysis is good, but monarchy is not good at the moment. I agree that in time, if we let our cities grow, monarchy will become the best solution. However this time will not come soon, not in 20 turns, not in 50 turns, perhaps not even in 100 turns.

Researching monarchy now and at full speed will be waste of our precious resources because we won't be able to switch to monarchy when we research it. If we could somehow switch to monarchy next turn, the maintenance cost would kill all our income and prevent building of new units. Also, bear in mind that upgrade cost to keshik is 90 gold apiece and that we will build many horses in the meantime, all of which will need to be upgraded, so we will need a steady tax income before chivalry.

My suggestion is to research construction at full speed. We will get code of laws from the bards and currency from AM. Then, since the horde thinks feudalism is not the government of our choice, we should stay in despotism until the number of our cities grows to 15 and their size grows to 7 or more. Then and only then or shortly before that time should we research monarchy and later switch to it.

	09-05-2005 20:02									#10
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Regarding production penalties suffered under despotism, they result in the following:

Irrigated grass and irrigated flood plains produce one less food and mined hill produces 2 shields instead of 3.

I don't think these penalties are that important right now. We have mostly plains which suffer no penalty, no mined hills at the moment, no plans to mine one and few workers to commit to such a task.

	09-05-2005 22:06									#11
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Sorry i have to disagree here Ljube, I dont want to get into a debate about numbers and the like.

It has to said that the best time to change to a government that will obviously improve our situation is ASAP

Also were heading now into a period of peace where we can focus on growth and expansion, things like temples and or libraries need to be considered as do markets.

Under the terms of the peace with AM we will be geting two free towns, we must also send a few settlers of our own out too but I see no reason to stay in despotism until we have 15 cities and frankly find that a ludricous suggestion. ludicrous because I ask why force ourselves to stay limited longer than necessary ?

This really now needs to be moved on in the form of a poll for the whole horde to cast their votes on

	09-05-2005 22:18									#12
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quote: Originally posted by ChrisiusMaximus This really now needs to be moved on in the form of a poll for the whole horde to cast their votes on

So let it be written...so let it be done!

Cast your vote here

	10-05-2005 00:34									#13
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quote: Originally posted by ChrisiusMaximus Sorry i have to disagree here Ljube, I dont want to get into a debate about numbers and the like. It has to said that the best time to change to a government that will obviously improve our situation is ASAP

Just a minute! You don't agree and yet you don't want to get into a debate about numbers. It's numbers that will kill us if we switch to monarchy now.

Please explain how exactly monarchy will improve our situation. I claim it will not improve but deteriorate our situation and severely hamper our ability to maintain the supremacy and wage war if need be.

Also, a technique called pop-rushing hamlets is not available under monarchy. Those are small ICS style size 1-2 towns whose only purpose is to pop rush units and then build worker. So, they can pop-rush horse every 20 turns and build worker every 20 turns. They will never suffer too much unhappiness as they will only rush once every 20 turns.

Workers generated in this way will be added to large cities to make them even larger or used for tile improvement. This technique will probably allow us to switch to monarchy in about 100 turns.

	10-05-2005 01:06									#14
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As i said im not bothered to debate numbers with you or anyone else, simply i dont do micro managment

One thing you have to understand about me ljube although i advocated the pop rush we recently did for the 2nd horseman, that was due to our then current situation, and was a sensible decision. I detest POP RUSH as a strategy, it simply is a means to an end, an end of a viable population, especially with so small a population.

In a monarchy you are quite correct to atate we will no longer be able to pop rush, and good riddance i say, if we build plenty of good infrastructure we will be able to afford cash rushing which is far far better to my mind.

You ask me to explain why monarchy is better than despotism, i say look at your own posts and you will answer that for yourself.

There is no way we want to sit about with low pop cities maintaining a despotic society just because we might be able to do a few pop rushes, total madness !!

I disagree with your estamates of 100 turns before Monarchy totally and Im confident I will not be a single voice

	10-05-2005 01:32									#15
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If we expect a prolonged period of peace we should surely leave despotism, the sooner the better.

Switching away from despotism when you have a large army is always painful. We'll have to pay *much* in unit upkeep until our city grows.


When talking about numbers, how fast can our cities grow once we leave despotism? Personally I view increased growth as the bigges reason to leave despotism. You'll suffer for a while but thanks to the rapid growth you will catch up later. As we are both strong and advanced at the moment we are better equipped than most to handle the temporary setback by a government change.

	10-05-2005 01:59									#16
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Our cities can't grow very fast. We have dry land (all plains) and some flood plains. But our cities lack the infrastructure needed for growth. This infrastructure is temples and markets. Without these things we can just as well forget about switching.


If forced to choose between switching to monarchy and staying despot (if denied feudalism) I choose to not switch at all. Simple math proves me right.

	10-05-2005 14:49									#17
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I agree with Ljube here. We do not want to switch to Monarchy immediately. We don't want to wait for 15 cities (13 actually) because the corruption will increase per city starting with city #3. We do, however, want to have enough city support for our armies before we switch (if that is possible). Thus...we are currently losing: from KBH 1 food & 1 gpt, from Bloodview 1 food (soon 1 gpt if we use the gold hill), from FA 2 food (assuming that this city is using the oasis). We are supporting 5 armies beyond our limit (of 20).

Now...KBH will (presumably) take 20 turns to get to size 6 and 10 to get to size 7. FA will likely never get to size 7 (or at least not for planning purposes) as it is our settler/worker factory. Bokhara will not grow quickly since it needs irrigation to grow any faster than 20 turns. Bloodview gets +4 fpt, so it grows in 5 turns. If we keep laborers on food-neutral (i.e. 2 fpt from tile worked) tiles it would take 20 turns to get to size 7, however...we are unlikely to be able to keep up this rate.

Despotism is definately a better government for us in the short run, but only in the short run (20-40 turns). The more cities we get, the more all of our cities will have corruption (other than KBH). I agree that we don't need to rush-research Monarchy right now. We can take our time, or even research other things...hoping that one of our opponents researches Monarchy first thus making it cheaper.

As for military support: We would need 6 cities (in despotism) to support our current units. Actually...we would support up to 3 more in the process. It would take 12 cities to give us the same support from Monarchy if all the cities are town-sized (<7). However...we are losing 1 gpt from the capital and will be losing one soon from Bloodview. Thus...just due to the tile penalty, we would have to reduce the needed quantity of cities to 11. The fact that corruption is much less means that we can probably further reduce the quantity of needed cities for support of our army.

Now...Since it will take >40 turns to get multiple cities to city (6 < X< 13) size, we should possibly not switch to Monarchy until some of those are ready to increase. The negative part of that is that the longer we wait (i.e. the larger our population) the longer period of anarchy we will suffer when we do switch.

I highly recommend that we do not wait beyond 40 turns to switch, as we should have at least 7-9 cities at that point and the resulting 'Rank' corruption will be prohibitive.

The following is excerpted from the thread in the CFC Military academy concerning corruption in cities (note that waste (i.e. loss of shields) runs the same way).

quote: Distance corruption depends on the distance of the city from the closest palace (or a constant number for communal governments), multiplied by a factor that depends on the government type (3/2 for Rampant corruption (Despotism), 3/4 for Minimal corruption (Democracy) 1 otherwise, and another factor if the city is not connected to your capital by road, harbor, or airport (5/4). Each corruption-reducing building in the city halves distance corruption. Rank corruption depends on the ratio of the city rank to the adjusted optimal city number. The city rank is equal to the number of cities closer to the capital (or half the total number of cities for Communism). The rate of increase of this corruption with rank doubles after rank exceeds the optimal city number. The optimal city number of the map gets modified by the difficulty level, the commercial trait, the current government, and the number of improvements and Wonders with the “reduces corruption” ability.

So...Once the optimum city number has been exceeded (in our case 13.6, so 13) the ranks will all effectively double. Up to that point, each city rank (i.e. cities that are either further away are built later) will increase in corruption. Note also that the distance corruption is 50% more in despotism than in Republic, Feudalism, Monarchy and Fascism.

For those wondering what the difference between Nuisance and Problematic is: the optimal number of cities will have a 0.1 factor added for Nuisance but not for problematic. Thus... our optimal city number for Monarchy is 13.6, where for Republic it would be 15.3.

The total explanation of corruption and all the equations can be found at http://www.civfanatics.com/civ3acad...ption_c3c.shtml

	10-05-2005 16:49									#18
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Rob, your estimate of 20-40 turns presumes we concentrate on growth hampering our military build-up for that time. Even if we do that I'm not sure we will be ready in 40 turns you project and our power will decrease.

My estimate of 100 turns and a rather optimistic one takes into account constant building of military units (horses) at high speed. At the moment we can't support the military we have in monarchy, let alone build some more. How many more units will we build in the next 40 turns?

Look, if you want a government without production penalties and growth oriented, it's feudalism. Two units supported by cities is enough because we will have more towns than cities. The core productive cities will be relatively few in numbers, say 8, while small towns will be about 15 in numbers. And the advantage of feudalism is that we can switch the minute we research it.

One last thing Rob. Can you please explain what you have against feudalism? It has same production and corruption as monarchy. Same military police. It has better unit support. We don't need to prepare for it. It seems feudalism is better suited for growth than monarchy as it will also allow us to research at good pace. The only problem I se with feudalism is war weariness. But I have been involved in prolonged wars under democracy. So if I could handle that then all of us can surely handle the less intensive war weariness suffered under feudalism.

	10-05-2005 18:35									#19
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

The war weariness is, in fact, the problem I have with Feudalism (along with the fact that the tech is many, many turns away). War weariness can be summed up as follows: don't ever lose more than one city or you are demolished.

Lost cities cause 17 pts of war weariness. Attacked units cause 2, destroyed units cause 2, redlined units cause 1. When the war weariness gets past 60, look out!

Lost cities include those we have just captured.

As for what we will be building...we will not produce all that many units from cities that are size 3 and 4. We must get bigger cities or we won't have an army capable of attacking anyone (whether we have sufficient cities to support one is irrelevant if we don't have the units). If, however, we were to concentrate (as you suggested) on building combat units, we would have growth of our cities as an inevitable consequence of not building settlers and workers.

Now...the other problem that arises is the population rushing. While we would already be suffering from war weariness (in a long, drawn-out war) we would also be limited in our ability to rush units. No matter how much cash we have on hand, we could not rush, for instance, a wall in a city of size 1. This means, if we take a city of size 2, we would almost always have to raze it. I don't like having my government determine my tactics.

	10-05-2005 18:40									#20
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I don't plan to lose a single city. If we can't defend it, we'll raze it.

Yes, war weariness can be a problem. But the fact we will always strike first and the overwhelming power of that strike due to our military supremacy will guarantee short wars with few casualties.

Also, we won’t need to stay in feudalism forever. We can switch to communism later on when it becomes available.


As for settlers, you know I support building more settlers, just not in KBH. I don't like workers because they cost maintenance.

	10-05-2005 20:20									#21
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Discussion about the plusses and minuses between Rcoutme and Ljube can be found here: http://apolyton.net/forums/showthre...threadid=133290

We both agree that we should switch Bloodview to a settler and should build a granary in FA (at least I think we agreed on the granary). We both believe Bokhara should build a worker immediately after it finishes the current horseman. As shown in the thread...the swordsman will be needed to be moved to Bloodview to protect the settler (once it is finished). The first city to be added should be the dye city. The one near Bokhara can wait for FA or some other city to build it (or even have the Porkers send their settler there).

	10-05-2005 22:17									#22
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I stated before this issue should be polled, no amount of differing opinions will change my vote which is for monarchy.

Remenber there are 15 members in the horde and they all have the right to cast there vote.

I disagree totally about feudalism, far too shortsighted to my mind, and PoP rushing only has very limited use.

	10-05-2005 23:39									#23
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quote: Originally posted by ChrisiusMaximus I stated before this issue should be polled, no amount of differing opinions will change my vote which is for monarchy. Remenber there are 15 members in the horde and they all have the right to cast there vote. I disagree totally about feudalism, far too shortsighted to my mind, and PoP rushing only has very limited use.

Hey Chris!

I am the one that asked Paddy to close the poll. While your mind may be made up (and with good reason IMHO ), others may want to see a debate before casting their vote. Since we are 15, and we do have a little time, what could a couple of days of debate hurt?

I must add, I am learning a tremendous amount about the "nuts and bolts" of these government types as well.

If, in the end, Monarchy is as good a choice as you and I believe, then I am sure the majority of the Horde will see that.

	21-09-2005 14:57									#24
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We need to get this matter sorted asap

Calling all hands, lets hear your opinions

	21-09-2005 15:01									#25
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need i say it Monarchy

I just think its way we are heading, were talking about building up some towns to super cities so that puts feudalism on a downer, were focussing on conquest so republic is perhaps not so good which leaves Monarchy the Warmongers dream Gov for the Middle ages.

Chances are were going to win this game during this era, so lets get the best Gov to do that with and eliminate War weariness issues

	21-09-2005 15:56									#26
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Long time since we have seen this thread.

Monarchy.

	21-09-2005 16:11									#27
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and yes this too will be polled.

before that - lets get all our points out

	22-09-2005 20:31									#28
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BLOODBANK BY ALAN BLOODSPAN APPRAISAL OF GOVERNMENTS


Our present situation and strategy is the following, the parameters for this decision:

We got Khans Blood Hall as our main city
We plan Tatu, Bokhara and Bloodview as major cities
We got some 10 and above minor towns
We intend to max out forces and preserve them
We will get 7 more units every 10 turn from KBH alone
We got some 50-60 units already
We intend to spend all gold on upgrades for the perpetuity, and we are still 600-700 short

Monarchy
4 cities size 7-12
10 cities size 1-6

36 free upkeep

Feudalism
4 cities size 7-12
10 cities size 1-6

62 Free Upkeep

Feudalism beats monarchy with a factor of 2 to 1.

Also, AM is Feudalism as well, and to match their strategy, where they control two of our luxes soon (spices, incense), we need to equate their strategy.
We will lose two luxes in an AM war, and we rarely use garrisons.

Following the revolution, it will take at least 60-70 turns of peaceful development for monarchy to pay off. This is the amount of time it takes for all our 14 cities to be above size 6, and provide 56 free upkeep, still less than feudalisms comfortable 62 free upkeep.

3 Gold per unit above 62? That is not even a problem, we would be happy to have more than 62 units, besides, we have soon two settler factories to increase the free upkeep by 10 units per 2nd city.

Scenarioes are for the post revolution (20 turns from now)


Parameters: Bards will be dead, Babylon badly reduced
Remaining, DR, LB and AM.


Dependency on AM for incense and spices
Dependency on DR for gems
Dependency on LB to attack either side, East-West
1000 gold needed for upgrades after revolution, no gold earnt during revolution
We actually manage to get Bloodview, Tatu and Bokhara over 6 pop (not very likely for all)
We do not build more small towns (not very likely)

Estimated gold income 72 in all cases
A, B, and C are case units

Monarchy: Estimated free upkeep 36
Estimated Horde units
A 36 - 0 upkeep paid, 36 saved
B 54 - 18 upkeep paid, 54 saved
C 72 - 36 upkeep paid, 36 saved

Monarchy: Estimated free upkeep 62
Estimated Horde units
A 36 - 0 upkeep paid, 72 saved
B 54 - 0 upkeep paid - 72 saved
C 72 - 30 upkeep paid - 42 saved

Note, with this scenario, Monarchy pays off the following:

Units

73, 74, 75, 76, 77
35, 34, 33, 32, 31, 30, 29, 28
42, 39, 36, 33, 30

At 77 units, with this situation, given we quit building new towns, quit conquering new towns, and quit counting on upgrades, we will earn some 30 gold per turn with monarchy, and one gold more than feudalism per turn.
For the sake of flexibility, I would feel comfortable at troop levels 50-80 units with our present economy.
Remember, Horde got better quality troops, crusaders and ACs, along MDIs and Pikes and Keshiks, beat most what the other can field.

As Rob pointed out, the less population we have during the revolution, the less time anarchy takes. I am not quite sure, but I sense anarchy time is based on population ranking. Robs argument for monarchy was from a time where more large cities was a goal, feasible that is.
As it stands, Feudalism is more and more obvious.

I can attest Feudalism is better by a margin of 90-10 %.

Last edited by Omnistar on 23-09-2005 at 00:45

	22-09-2005 20:39									#29
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Thank you for the numbers Omni

Gives us more to consider in this debate