Transitioning From Tribe to Republic

[Tidster]

Playing as a tribal nation, I always seem to have difficulty with the transition to a republic… I get a good 20 years of stagnation and am hoping for some tips to smooth that out.

First, that civilization requirement to build the senate chambers is a bit tricky… is it just a matter of prioritizing importing gems and glass for the civilization bonus, or is there something else I should be doing early on to hit that mark sooner?

Second, when I complete the tribal reform mission, the senate approval is always absolutely awful for me. Normally I have a moderate amount of tyranny (20-30) at that point to keep the aggressive expansion down from my early game conquests, so I have no hope of winning over democrats approval until significantly after the transition. How can I get that approval up (without cheesing it, I know that trick of shuffling administrators, exiting the game, then reloading it so the approval gets recalculated) so I can get back to expanding without spiking tyranny entirely?

Any other tips for expanding through the transition or tips for preparing for the inevitable conflict with a bigger neighbor while still not established?

Thanks!

 

[DukeLeto42]

First, that civilization requirement to build the senate chambers is a bit tricky… is it just a matter of prioritizing importing gems and glass for the civilization bonus, or is there something else I should be doing early on to hit that mark sooner?

Buildings are your friend.

 

[Synen]

From my experience the best way to more easily switch to a monarchy/republic is to kickstart your economy by saving up money and building cities on territories that have expensive trade goods on them for the +1 trade good so that you can trade those away. I usually make my capital my first city.

Also change your researchers for researchers that have obsessive, intelligent, polymath or scholar traits. These traits will sometimes give you events that will give you a free innovation point. Save up your innovations until you can unlock foundries. Build a foundry in every city to get another +1 trade good that you can trade away.

Once your economy is up and running you'll have enough income to start developing your capital city. Building buildings will increase the maximum civilization value. Changing the governor policy of your capital to civilization effort will increase your monthly civilization. Over time you'll get to the 40 civilization that you need to become a republic.

The most important moment for senate approval is on day 1 of the game or in your case day 1 of you becoming a republic. Approval tends to snowball over time so the sooner you have it the easier it will be to keep it high.

If you go to the government tab you'll see the parties at the bottom with the portraits of the party leaders. Just below each portrait you'll see an agenda for each party that will increase their party's approval if you fulfill their agenda. Below that you'll find buttons for each party that will instantly increase their approval for a cost.

I would suggest pressing the button to instantly increase the approval of the biggest party on day 1. After that work on fulfilling the biggest party's agenda as quickly as possible. You should have 60 approval after that. Once in a while you'll get an event where you can get approval as well.

 

[Tidster]

Thanks for the feedback. Been playing since release and found a more challenging start and your feedback helped.

Had three failed starts as Dardania (two prior to your advice). Found that’s it’s a pretty unforgiving start, since you’re sandwiched between the Thrace/Macedonia and Rome… and if you get a slow start or stagnate for a spell, Rome will steamroll you.

For my current run, which is looking to be one of my best of any nation I’ve played, a big difference was expanding eastward first, then west… those tiny hilly nations take a bit more time early game to siege and that time turns into war weariness, which forces you to push your tyranny for those rituals.

This time I had the foundry suggestion in mind… using researchers that could get breakthroughs was huge and I resisted using gold for all but the most needed relation improvements to get that first city as soon as possible, then getting a forge in there… then forged in the few cities I could capture early (couldn’t or perhaps too scared to go straight at Macedon or Thrace off the bat).

The forge also helped with the civilization requirement for the senate chambers… lots of playthroughs I would get stuck at 36-38 max civilization without enough gold/income to keep building. Getting that forge and continuing with research breakthroughs for the temple along with importing glass was enough to get over that hump.

I was aggressive, but not as aggressive as previous playthroughs and the higher stability and lower tyranny made the transition after the switch much smoother. Since Tyranny was still too much to get democrat support, I had to be vigilant about keeping characters affiliated with that party out of office even if their stats are good… that helped get that senate influence high enough to get back to expansion sooner.

I did get very lucky in one regard this playthrough… for the first time since a very early game version, Rome was a dud. Apparently they got triple teamed early by Carthage, the Etruscans, and Epirus. I had no idea that there was an event if the Etruscans beat Rome they install a puppet king and make Rome a feudatory. The Etruscans started rolling into Illyria, attacked me, but Rome was disloyal and didn’t join… I mopped the floor with the Etruscans, snagged most of cisalpine Gaul, then since they were disloyal got Rome to switch to be my feudatory.

So basically thanks to your help, I’m 120 years in, over 550 territories, Rome is my feudatory, and all of Gaul and Germania are easy to pick off tribes. If only the damn traditionalist would stop asking me to unintigrate cultures right before I go to war!

 

[Synen]

If you ever have problems trying to declare war because of senate approval then you can try to use threaten war instead of declaring war for your claim(s). If the ai refuses to cede the territory that you claimed then the refusal will automatically start a war with them. Senate approval is more forgiving for threaten war than for declaring war.