Does anyone do the Bureacracy/Capital flip trick?

[stormwriter]

Sometimes i think of trying to make another city the capital, and then because of Bureacracy - get the +50 hammers and +50 gold in that new capital.
I haven't attempted this though, cause my capital seems to always be my monster-producer, and i don't want to mess with that.
It might also alleviate some "distance from capital" issues, but then again, that's what the Forbidden Palace is for anyways...

Any thoughts?

(or is it Capitol with an "o"??)

[upsidedown]

This probably wouldn't be effective but what if you switched over to Bureacracy and switched the capital to a newly built city to get a major boost?

Doubtful but it would be interesting to see what would happen.

[Blake]

In some cases I've considered flipping my capital with a little help from the Barbs.

Found the 2nd city, wait for a barb warrior to show up, move your warriors out of the capital, take it back the next turn .

It'd be rare that this is actually a good idea, but it does have a few uses:
1) If your capital sucks (which is unusual) but you find a great 2nd city site that will grow much faster and use the +1 happy better.
2) "Free" culture in the 2nd city from the palace.
3) A better location, like if it's obvious you have to expand in a particular direction.

Now, losing the city to the barbs results in destruction of buildings, so you probably only want to do this in the extremely early game, or at least plan for it by not building things in the capital that will just be lost. You also need 3+ warriors or 2+ archers to ensure taking the city back.

[Urban Ranger]

Quick question - does each barbarian city have its own palace?

[Blake]

Nope. Palaces give culture. Barb cities don't have culture unless they build an Obelix, Castle or Wonder.

[Drachasor]

The only thing I do about moving a capital is I try to build Versailles in a central region near my capital (usually the capital is a bit off-center). Then I can move my capital around and I'll still have low maintainance with my core. This is good for warmongering, since the capital is the only one you can move around once built (though you can build a new forbidden palace if you lose the city the current one is in). So I usually build the FP in a center of a new conquest (on pangea I try to spread out these over the continent evenly).

The nice thing about Civ IV is that the distance from the capital ONLY affects maintainance. That's the gold cost per turn that you have to pay for each city (out of your net gold made each turn). As such a city can be just as productive if it is on the other side of the world from your capital or if it is your capital. So moving the capital around is pretty painless.

-Drachasor

[khumak]

The only time I ever switch my capitol is when I wind up in a situation where I've already built a forbidden palace and my empire has expanded since then to a point where it would be nice to have another "capitol" in the middle of the new area i expanded to. A good example is when later in the game you conquer a 2nd continent. Moving your capitol to a city in the middle of that new continent could be worthwhile.

[Common Sensei]

Originally posted by Blake
Nope. Palaces give culture. Barb cities don't have culture unless they build an Obelix, Castle or Wonder.

Has anyone seen an instance where a Barbarian city builds a wonder? It's an amusing prospect.

[knighterrant]

Yes, I distincly remember the barbarian empire building collossus. They may have constructed others at other times that I didn't really notice.

[Artuero]

It would be nice if the computer would tell you the optimal place for your palace/FP. As it is I just guess. On terra maps I try to build Versailles in the new world and I never usually get around to building the FP.

[MattPilot]

Originally posted by Common Sensei


Has anyone seen an instance where a Barbarian city builds a wonder? It's an amusing prospect.

Barb city once build stonehenge in one of my games.

I guess none of the AI civs were fond of that wonder

[Krill]

I have done this before, right after build Versailes in a good city that was near the centre of my old empire. The new city was in the centre of more land that I had captured. I wanted to keep the FP available for when I went and captured some more land, and it worked pretty well.

[Drachasor]

Originally posted by Krill
I have done this before, right after build Versailes in a good city that was near the centre of my old empire. The new city was in the centre of more land that I had captured. I wanted to keep the FP available for when I went and captured some more land, and it worked pretty well.

Yeah, the palace is nice for moving around. Versailles and FP can't be moved so one has to be much more careful about where one places them.

-Drachasor