How many cities do you build and around what turn

[steinernein]

True.

Reading some other opinions and playstyles to compare to is interesting.

I for one go 2nd city immediatelly, then I tech to tier 2, get some tactic pool, and then 3rd city. I make regular use of the strategic recon outpost, and try to avoid border collision to not get in conflict. However, since a city so worth so much more, if you can get those nice buildings in the sectors freed, I tend to adapt my army strength to the next interesting sector, growing like a snake towards them, and trying to field an army ASAP that can clear those buildings.

The whole economy tree though seems to fall behind when I play, as I never get to it as other stuff is more important, which I thought is a bit weird. After all you get shown the icons for the sectors right in your face all the time, which always makes me go: "I need to unlock that FERTILE PLAIN spec (or whatever spec for that matter). By the time I actually get to it, I have enough food anyway, and usually fought my first war and maybe eliminated the first NPC.

So somehow it feels a bit off. I always WANT to go more eco early, but I never actually do (so far).

And when in multiplayer, it seems that you are so pressed for military strength that 75% of the game lies dormant. If you have a human player at your doorsteps, spamming units, there just is no time for more cities and more eco. Which I find a bit sad.

I will go for a second city immediately depending on what I initially scout out; if I can exploit some areas nearby or if I get lucky and have a nearby Cosmite spawn then I might as well get my city out as soon as possible so I have enough pop to claim the sector that has the cosmite -- usually, I don't want to settle on the area with the cosmite because the specialties in the area are guarded so I would rather have +10 resource and have to grow 2+ pop and claim a sector rather than 0 resource until I clear out the mobs.

Otherwise, I will scout and grab the sector that has the nearest cosmite.

While scouting I am also looking for settlements that I can buy with influence and usually by turn 20ish or so I only have a total of 3 cities and it'll be time to go to war or prepare for it. SynthGuard drones can happen way earlier too, I am not sure about what other equivalent power spikes people have at around turns 10-20 that have the same mobility (those units fly after all so mountains and normal travel issues won't matter to them).


So I guess I am really looking only to have 3 cities before evaluating if I can expand more or if I have to just declare war and get it over with. I want to try and experiment with only going with two cities, the second city being a settlement from influence and just using all my cosmite for upgrades so I can take down a NPC or grab an early gold dungeon.

You get resources for massacring NPCs (the whole quest line plus the shit they're standing on) and their hub is a level 5 exploit. Might be worth checking out if you spawn close enough to one and have an early tech path that gives you the power spike to take them down.

 

[Urza1234]

I don't think "tall" works well unless you're super lucky with Landmarks and other bonuses, because no matter what you'll get more unhappy citizens than you can support with various +happiness effects in a single Sector. And you need energy. A lot of it. So a bunch of cities is necessary. You should probably aim to try making at least one Sector dedicated to various unit empowerment bonuses, but aside from that you need a bunch of Sectors with energy focus.

Maybe with the secret tech that boosts the energy-stealing operation?

But yah, you probably want at least 2 colonies imo so you can stack all 8 base exploit buildings.

 

[ZhukoDim]

Man, it is nightmare trying to manage citys in this game right now. The idea with manually capturing and managing every sector looked cool only in first 15-20 games or so.

Mind you that I played only 2 smallest maps so far. And the amount of cities and busy work with them growing exceptionally fast. Playstyle also does not matter. If you not build citys you capture them anyway.

The only way to somehow fix the problem is to revert back to the influence system when you capture more land with it. No need to to scrap the idea of bonuses from climate and landscape, just make it persetage based and work with it imho. Can't imagine how people can play on bigger maps.

Faster solution is making 2 sectors between citys but still.

 

[Mauer]

Man, it is nightmare trying to manage citys in this game right now. The idea with manually capturing and managing every sector looked cool only in first 15-20 games or so.

Mind you that I played only 2 smallest maps so far. And the amount of cities and busy work with them growing exceptionally fast. Playstyle also does not matter. If you not build citys you capture them anyway.

The only way to somehow fix the problem is to revert back to the influence system when you capture more land with it. No need to to scrap the idea of bonuses from climate and landscape, just make it persetage based and work with it imho. Can't imagine how people can play on bigger maps.

Faster solution is making 2 sectors between citys but still.

You don't have to capture cities either, there's other win conditions than domination.

 

[Sartarius]

It depends on difficulty level. I am always playing on highest and quickly understood that you need to expand like hell to about 10 colonies. With some luck on cosmite I had 9 colonies by turn 22 including those I bought from indies.

 

[Frank327]

It depends on difficulty level. I am always playing on highest and quickly understood that you need to expand like hell to about 10 colonies. With some luck on cosmite I had 9 colonies by turn 22 including those I bought from indies.

Assuming you got 2 independent settlements, that means you got 180 cosmite (that's 70 more than base) and a colonizer every 3 turns. Impressive.

 

[Goblin-Cookie]

The problem with this strategy is that those units won't ever become "super elite". A tier 1 unit at max XP with 3 mods can't stand up to a T3 unit fresh out of the box with 2 mods. It's not even close.

Also you don't get any long term advantage. Everyone can get their starting army to max XP and only add the last two mods to the units when they've established soms extra cities.

I am talking from experience, they very much do become super-elite. And it also the case that a well modded, elite level one army can take on a several basic T3 units.

You cannot get your starting army to max XP without mods, because they will die far too often. Healing and armour mods are essential to keeping your units alive.

In any case, this is only an early game strategy. Once you have a few stacks of fully modded and upgraded Level-1 units, you have enough cosmite to expand your territory. This then allows you to get the high-level units or massed ranks to actually win the game. The cosmite and gold NOT spent replacing units is very useful to this effect.

 

[Frank327]

I guess there is where our experiences differ. I find it pretty easy to keep my T1 army alive by just having a support unit and giving my T1 units 1 mod. And the risk with delaying your expansion is that you research the T3 units and essential mods much later than your opponents.

Also a scenario where your "super elite" T1 army faces "several basic" T3 units doesn't happen. The T3 are always modded and supported by other units.

 

[steinernein]

I guess there is where our experiences differ. I find it pretty easy to keep my T1 army alive by just having a support unit and giving my T1 units 1 mod. And the risk with delaying your expansion is that you research the T3 units and essential mods much later than your opponents.

Also a scenario where your "super elite" T1 army faces "several basic" T3 units doesn't happen. The T3 are always modded and supported by other units.

I think a good benchmark is by turn 20 if you don't have two or three stacks of units decked out in 2/3 cosmite mods you will be in trouble.

It doesn't matter if you pull ahead in tech because the difference won't be that great, if you change the map size and the threat size along with the player density you'll lean more towards having cities sooner because impending death isn't around the corner -- as an aside given how annoying it is to maintain cities, I would say that most people would play on large rather than enormous. I also tend to play on "land" type.

 

[Dreepa]

I also tend to play on "land" type.

Quick off topic question:
Does "land" type have patches of lakes / seas?

 

[steinernein]

Quick off topic question:
Does "land" type have patches of lakes / seas?

Yeah, but it's usually only one sector and rarely is it connected to another body of water.

Also, rushing a NPC if it spawns near you is pretty much pure profit. Usually cosmite nearby and a settlement. But beyond that some tier 3-4 weapons and a ton of resources, plus the rewards you get for cleansing 10 units.