Mid / Lategame Advices Needed

[direstrait727]

Hi guys,

a loooong text is incoming, sorry for that

so i have two games now, in which i grew big from being small in the beginning. as syracuse i formed magna graecia and even got latium from rome. as epirus i formed macedon.

and now i feel like i lagg a lot in mid or lategame tactics or even knowledge. i basically have no clue how to proceed (not the games fault, i guess there are a lot of options, but i am just not knowing what do to lol)

i always have a shit load of money and i dont know where to invest.

therefore some questions

a) what about the culture, integration?
a1) what cultures are you integrating? what are your key factors to decide what to integrate? since i got latium i have many romans in my country. since i conquered macedon i have many macedons as epirus. i integrated both. but does it even make sense to do so or do you just integrate cultures which helps you to get further on the military traditions? (as greeks for example persians, as magna graecia for example carthage).
a2) if you integrate them, do you give them rights of citizens or do you even make them nobles? what are pros and cons? if you just say they are allowed to become citizens, what happens with the nobles? do they grade down or do they become my primary culture?
a3) if you dont integrate them, what is more important for stability and loyality - assimiliation or conversion? (if i conquer carthage for example, they are not greek and not hellenic religion, what do you do first?)
a4) if you want to integrate someone, are you just directly going for it or are you making some decisions first, like allowing marriage and heritage and so on (i dont recall the correct names, but i mean the decisions next to the integrate button)? or are you starting integration and to speed this up you allow marriage on top?
a5) i had one game with athen, where i did a successful run on the Pentecontaetia achievement. i later founded the hellenic league (or something like that, i play in german so no clue what the english word is) and at some point my originally integrated culture of macedon (i integrated them for a better chance on the achievement) was not integrated anymore. how come? was this a decision by the senate where i did not pay attention to or was this because i founded the hellenic league or how can this happen? i declared war on rome and had like no levies since all macedons were not included. good that i got all three achievements with athens already before that happened, so no worries, but i want to understand

b) city planning
b1) where do you build cities and why?
b2) what buildings are you going for and where? temples, theaters first in new provinces? or are you going mines and production first?
b3) metropolises whereever a temple for the pantheon is available i guess?
b4) what buildings? i build a shit load of aqueducts, market places and libraries, is that right?
b5) what kind of settlement buildings are you building where? are you going for mines first? Provincial Legation everywhere where you want to assimilate?

c) which steps next?
c1) i conquered a lot of land from being a noone. are you then trying to get all sorted out first , get 100 loyalty in those newly acquired provinces, stack your production, turn everyone which is not integrated into your religion and culture or are you conquering more and more?
c2) do you get feudatories much?

d) any other mid/ lategame advices are mostly welcome

thanks a lot <3 and sorry for the long text but i really want to raise my game to the next level and maybe even start with a major nation anytime soon

 

[Jiben]

Okay this was a long one but:

a1) i integrate cultures i wanna steal military traditions from, other than that i may integrate really huge cultures no matter if i need them, i agree with macedonian being good, if you ever expand into anatolia you would likely find more macedonian pops which would basically give pain free expansion for example. Punic is also good, roman is too if they have assimilated some but they dont start too large.

a2) almost always just citizens, if the integrated culture is larger than my primary culture i might consider nobles but other than that i dont see it being worth it. Since integrating to nobles give a hit to integrated culture happiness across the board, they demote into citizens.

a3) conversion is always almost faster but for pure happiness you can look it up since it depends on your happiness level and such. But assuming no happiness boosts to right religion and that all gods in your pantheon are your religion then right religion is +16% happiness which often would be less than what having them be of a integrated culture would be but that would depend on your cultural happiness which you can look at in the culture tab.

a4) i personally think cultural rights cost too much stability but i play kinda expansionistic so i rarely have stability to spare, if you wanna give them rights it's not a horrible idea if you got stability to spare.

a5) sounds like a bug sorry i don't know.

b1) i try to build one in each province atleast, where to build it depends on the terrain and tradegoods but i always make the city the province capital

b2) focus on your capital first and get it to become a metropolis, if your capital is in a bad spot (frigid mountains or something) consider moving it.

After building a good capital it depends mines/farming settlements are good in settlements but only if you actually get a new tradegood out of it, building a mine in a 2 pop territory does next to nothing and is a waste of money while building one in a 20 pop territory likely would give another tradegood and be really good.

After that build up your other cities prioritize great temples/ great theatres/foundries if you have unlocked them after that decide what you want the city to speciallize in, i almost alwats make it a noble or citizen city for research and traderoutes but if you wanna build a slavecity i wont stop you.

b3) metropolises would be best for pantheon temples yeah but if you see a city with close enough pops (like 60) consider making it a metropolis anyway, if you wanna argue you'd rather buy provincial investments for your capital i'd buy that but atleast keep building metropolises (metropoli?) as a option.

b4) sounds good but make sure to build the higher tier buildings first like academy (if you want nobles) since while expensive they give more per building than the cheaper ones (only build buildings for one maybe two pop types)

b5) mines/farming settlements first after that it depends i mostly build slave estates since the others seem not worth it but build whatever you want building non mines/farm settlement settlement building would be my last priority anyway.

c1) i just keep going, once you hit a critical mass (lets say 1000 territories or so) it's no longer a question of how much you can take but how fast so i like to push my country, sure rebellions will happen but if you are the undisputed number one you can crush 5 rebellions while figthing a war no issue. They can passively conbert/assimilate while i conquer more.

c2) feudatories are really good even if i personally dont like them much, feeding land to a vassal grants the vassal the ae and not you so perfect fro conquest, also good to have them hold e´wrong culture/religion land.

d) Assuming you are strong and stable and have stacked modifiers throughout the game (inventions etc) you can basically conquer as much in the last 75 years as the rest of the campaign if you are willing to push it hard and are willing to snake and have temporarly bad borders and such.

 

[olivenkranz]

Okay this was a long one but:

a1) i integrate cultures i wanna steal military traditions from, other than that i may integrate really huge cultures no matter if i need them, i agree with macedonian being good, if you ever expand into anatolia you would likely find more macedonian pops which would basically give pain free expansion for example. Punic is also good, roman is too if they have assimilated some but they dont start too large.

a2) almost always just citizens, if the integrated culture is larger than my primary culture i might consider nobles but other than that i dont see it being worth it. Since integrating to nobles give a hit to integrated culture happiness across the board, they demote into citizens.

a3) conversion is always almost faster but for pure happiness you can look it up since it depends on your happiness level and such. But assuming no happiness boosts to right religion and that all gods in your pantheon are your religion then right religion is +16% happiness which often would be less than what having them be of a integrated culture would be but that would depend on your cultural happiness which you can look at in the culture tab.

a4) i personally think cultural rights cost too much stability but i play kinda expansionistic so i rarely have stability to spare, if you wanna give them rights it's not a horrible idea if you got stability to spare.

a5) sounds like a bug sorry i don't know.

b1) i try to build one in each province atleast, where to build it depends on the terrain and tradegoods but i always make the city the province capital

b2) focus on your capital first and get it to become a metropolis, if your capital is in a bad spot (frigid mountains or something) consider moving it.

After building a good capital it depends mines/farming settlements are good in settlements but only if you actually get a new tradegood out of it, building a mine in a 2 pop territory does next to nothing and is a waste of money while building one in a 20 pop territory likely would give another tradegood and be really good.

After that build up your other cities prioritize great temples/ great theatres/foundries if you have unlocked them after that decide what you want the city to speciallize in, i almost alwats make it a noble or citizen city for research and traderoutes but if you wanna build a slavecity i wont stop you.

b3) metropolises would be best for pantheon temples yeah but if you see a city with close enough pops (like 60) consider making it a metropolis anyway, if you wanna argue you'd rather buy provincial investments for your capital i'd buy that but atleast keep building metropolises (metropoli?) as a option.

b4) sounds good but make sure to build the higher tier buildings first like academy (if you want nobles) since while expensive they give more per building than the cheaper ones (only build buildings for one maybe two pop types)

b5) mines/farming settlements first after that it depends i mostly build slave estates since the others seem not worth it but build whatever you want building non mines/farm settlement settlement building would be my last priority anyway.

c1) i just keep going, once you hit a critical mass (lets say 1000 territories or so) it's no longer a question of how much you can take but how fast so i like to push my country, sure rebellions will happen but if you are the undisputed number one you can crush 5 rebellions while figthing a war no issue. They can passively conbert/assimilate while i conquer more.

c2) feudatories are really good even if i personally dont like them much, feeding land to a vassal grants the vassal the ae and not you so perfect fro conquest, also good to have them hold e´wrong culture/religion land.

d) Assuming you are strong and stable and have stacked modifiers throughout the game (inventions etc) you can basically conquer as much in the last 75 years as the rest of the campaign if you are willing to push it hard and are willing to snake and have temporarly bad borders and such.

I want to add to
a3) I do Religion first because its generally faster than assimilation. Its also easier to stack modifiers.
b2) I build mines and farms everywhere once I have the money. I then check for rarer tradegoods that produce a decent amount in trade and block surplus and move slaves to get the 2nd tradegood. Doesn matter if the provincial capital has a bit less, it'll replenish.
b3) I choose my metropolises (or metropoleis) on pop size, trade good and great wonders. Or feeling sometimes. If necessary I kill a holy site in some settlement somewhere to put into the future metropolis. I also sack holy sites for the items, so Persia usually ends up with no temples left.
c2) feudatories (and tribal vassals too to some extent) should be kept at least some, because in the mid to late game they will be buying your goods and important for your trade.

 

[Ampalemvi]

a2) I like to integrate cultures up to noble rights until enough nobles have been promoted to fill the ratio. Then I switch them to citizen rights which gives a temporary -10% happiness debuff but doesn't force them to demote. Nobles in cultures with citizen rights are as productive as nobles in cultures with noble rights.