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I think it is really just asking which level would you start on where you would "expect" to win with an average (or slightly worse) start.
LD: I would recommend you get to understand the cost side of the game to figure out why your expansion is hitting you so hard. It could, for example, be that you are running high military costs although I suspect it is more likely that city maintenance and civic costs are the ones hurting you. In the latter case, there are several ways to manage those costs
a) Cottages - provide extra commerce to cover your costs and in time provide a good contribution to both costs and tech
b) Courthouses - to reduce city costs
c) Currency - provides extra trade routes for cities and markets for increased commerce and to allow merchants to contribute to gold. Check also here about whether your trade income can improve. In some situations, trade commerce can be over one third of your total commerce - you need foreign trade routes (ie Open Borders) for the highest trade so good diplomatic relations with some civs is important.
d) A religious shrine will provide a tidy contribution to general costs
e) Libraries are also a cheap way of increasing techs
f) And don't forget those high commerce specials (Calendar might be an important tech here)
Further down the line there are grocers and banks.
Generally it makes sense to have a number of cities concentrating more on commerce than production. A varied mix of cities will perform better than one where all cities are similar.
There are other ways of supporting tech investment without worrying too much about an increasing tech rate. For example, a specialist driven economy in which you have Pyramids (for Representation) will allow you to run scientist specialists to fuel tech and also run a very low tech slider (even 0%). Other wonders can also provide high commerce/gold/beaker benefits.
Also there's lots of money to be made from capturing cities. You can always raze them if the costs of looking after them is too high.
And the military can also provide you some money in other ways including
- pillaging
- demanding techs from weaker neighbours
Then there is a tech trading strategy you can use. Bee-line to a decent but weak tech and you can often use this as trade fodder for other techs. Compass is often a good tech for this.
With so many ways to get round the problem of a low slider, there is no single rule to apply. That's why it is more important to "get a feel" for how the economic side of the game fits together. As you get to know it better you will be better able to see when you are starting to run into problems and then will be able to adopt a strategy before the problem becomes more serious.
LD: I would recommend you get to understand the cost side of the game to figure out why your expansion is hitting you so hard. It could, for example, be that you are running high military costs although I suspect it is more likely that city maintenance and civic costs are the ones hurting you. In the latter case, there are several ways to manage those costs
a) Cottages - provide extra commerce to cover your costs and in time provide a good contribution to both costs and tech
b) Courthouses - to reduce city costs
c) Currency - provides extra trade routes for cities and markets for increased commerce and to allow merchants to contribute to gold. Check also here about whether your trade income can improve. In some situations, trade commerce can be over one third of your total commerce - you need foreign trade routes (ie Open Borders) for the highest trade so good diplomatic relations with some civs is important.
d) A religious shrine will provide a tidy contribution to general costs
e) Libraries are also a cheap way of increasing techs
f) And don't forget those high commerce specials (Calendar might be an important tech here)
Further down the line there are grocers and banks.
Generally it makes sense to have a number of cities concentrating more on commerce than production. A varied mix of cities will perform better than one where all cities are similar.
There are other ways of supporting tech investment without worrying too much about an increasing tech rate. For example, a specialist driven economy in which you have Pyramids (for Representation) will allow you to run scientist specialists to fuel tech and also run a very low tech slider (even 0%). Other wonders can also provide high commerce/gold/beaker benefits.
Also there's lots of money to be made from capturing cities. You can always raze them if the costs of looking after them is too high.
And the military can also provide you some money in other ways including
- pillaging
- demanding techs from weaker neighbours
Then there is a tech trading strategy you can use. Bee-line to a decent but weak tech and you can often use this as trade fodder for other techs. Compass is often a good tech for this.
With so many ways to get round the problem of a low slider, there is no single rule to apply. That's why it is more important to "get a feel" for how the economic side of the game fits together. As you get to know it better you will be better able to see when you are starting to run into problems and then will be able to adopt a strategy before the problem becomes more serious.
), never (so far) on Deity, haven't tried anything in between.
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