Monarchy vs. Republic

[Redstone]

I'm in the middle of a game as Rome, monarch level difficulty. I was using a Monarchy government for ages as I waged war on first Egypt (ancient era) and then Greece (early medieval era). I have a good sized army of legionary, horsemen, catapults and some pikemen (so I've got units in the defensive unit upgrade path). Egypt were beaten easily and I got several GLs - first one formed a legionary army and second one rushed the forbidden palace.

But Greece proved a tougher opponent - the hoplite are evenly matched with the legionary and Alexander sent a concentrated swordsmen counter-attack. As the war with Greece dragged on I was slipping further behind in the tech race - my advisor telling me that the other civs (on another continent who I had no contact with) were completing wonders that I'd not even researched the tech for. By this stage I'd stopped research cos I didn't see the point - the gold is more valuable than the science. The downside is my legionary based military was going to become obsolete soon.

So for the sake of getting back into the tech race I planned to switch to Republic. I defined the 2 Greek cities that I had to conquer (1 with ivory and 1 on MY land) - focussed my army on those objectives and got building marketplaces in cities without barracks.

I got the 2 Greek cities I wanted, got a couple of techs out of Alexander in the peace settlement, switched to Republic (doesn't anarchy seem to last forever when your not a religious civ???) and now I'm catching up on the techs which are coming pretty fast as they're so cheap after the other civs have got them.

I think my strategy now is to go for democracy and continue building up the cities I captured, with the aim of going back to war when I've got a decent industrial era military. Need to build my navy too cos the next war could be inter-continental.

Man, I like this game!

[planetfall]

Which is better, ah, what's your style?

It is impossible to know which is better until we know key parts of your game:

1-- what level are you playing at?

2-- are you a builder or a warmonger?

3-- Do you like long wars or short wars?

4-- Are you playing a religious civ?

Level below Regent, skip monarchy and go Republic.

Builder-- go republic.

Warmonger-- depends on war style.

Long wars-- forget republic, go Monarchy.

Short wars-- lots of territory, go Republic.
If average territory, it doesn't matter.

Religious civ-- who cares, you can switch fast, and not wait 7 turns between govs.

Caution-- you can go Monarchy without happiness and production infrastructure, but you are better off in Despotism than Republic if these are not in place first.