Monarchy vs Republic

[Light Lord]

Come on people lets here some pros and cons and see if we can get somebody all riled up on this...my personal quick thoughts go something like this. I like republic for long game because of the culture and production. However i will sometimes use Monarchy to rush some units or improvments if i dont have the gold to spare. Currently im trying out Monarchy and it seems to be holding up so far =))

[War4ever]

Re: Monarchy vs Republic

Originally posted by Light Lord
I like republic for long game because of the culture and production. However i will sometimes use Monarchy to rush some units or improvments if i dont have the gold to spare. Currently im trying out Monarchy and it seems to be holding up so far =))

uh monarchy rushes like republic......via gold not population

[Jason]

Despotism -> Republic here. I can imagine a stressful war that MIGHT be better fought with monarchy, but then despotism does have the advantage of force-building.

But even Republic is tolerable for aggressive war so long as you plan to win it in reasonably good time.

I wouldn't rush at governments techs(rather than doing other low but not dead end techs) as some advise. There might be a good way to exploit the 32 turn bonus there, but single-minded government hunting often gets you Republic or Monarchy before you actually even get any advantage out of it - and that's a bad thing.

[Aeson]

Between Monarchy and Republic, I would choose Republic. Of course both are completely overshadowed in efficiency by Despotism, and later Communism. The reason I would choose Republic over Monarchy, is that the only time I would switch to either is when I don't plan on being at war, and war weariness and unit support costs are the only weaknesses of Republic when compared to Monarchy.

[Grim Legacy]

Somehow, Monarchy turned out to be incredibly powerful for me. I wage wars at ease and produce a lot of units, while growing fast. My cities are well above 20 and happiness is very high, without any % luxuries. To my surprise, my research is quite speedy as well. I'm not changing a winning team.

[Crom]

The main problem I had with monarchy was that for some reason my borders were very slow in expanding and I had to put up with the Otto and his cronies building cities in the middle of my kingdom.

No similar problems with a new game and Republic, the space between my cities fills up quite quickly.

[Grim Legacy]

Originally posted by Crom
The main problem I had with monarchy was that for some reason my borders were very slow in expanding and I had to put up with the Otto and his cronies building cities in the middle of my kingdom.

No similar problems with a new game and Republic, the space between my cities fills up quite quickly.

Culture is not directly linked to Government though... maybe the Republic made buying improvements easier for you?

[eao]

My decision to go with Monarchy or Republic is based almost entirely on Luxury availability. If you can get 5 or 6 luxuries, and marketplaces in your cities, Republic is super productive. This stragegy of course forces you to be active diplomatically. If you are looking to play an isolationist regime, Monarchy will give you production bonuses, with less discontent citizens than Republic, without the need for as many Luxuries.

[MarshalN]

Yup, I think luxuries play a part, as well as whether there is an ongoing war or the possibily of an ongoing war. Republic will hinder you there if you have little luxuries, and if you plan on being aggressive and declare on other people -- seems like citizens don't like that too much in republic

[Thrawn05]

I head for Republic, then go rush for democracy. I love seeing workers build them roads in 1 turn

[eMarkM]

I'm playing Emperor now and find myself skipping Monarchy altoghther. Not so much because I think it's not worth it, but because it's "optional" and anyway I can get up the tech tree and keep pace w/ AI I'll take it. So I skip a lot of the optional advances, including Monarchy. Eventually I'll trade/tribute for it, but it's not a priority. I wage my early wars in Despot for the pop rushing and switch to republic when in peace. Going from Despot->Republic->Democracy is my path. Switch to Communism in late game if I'm in prolonged war.

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[Eryana]

Luxuries and income are what I look at. Monarchy still supports some of your military for free. If you have a large army, and not all the infrastructure in place, you might have trouble paying for your army in Republic.

I also look at the size of my cities. If I've been busily cranking out settlers/workers and pop-rushing stuff, most of my cities are probably fairly small. Mostly size 2 or 3, with a few larger cities. Those small cities don't work enough squares to generate enough commerce to pay for themselves. If I've been pop-rushing buildings, I can easily have a size 2 or 3 city with a temple + library, maybe a granary and/or a barracks. No way that city will be able to pay for all those buildings AND the garrison units.

In this case, if Monarchy is available, I'll switch to that for a little while. It frees me from the production restrictions of Despot, but doesn't destroy my income. Once most of my cities are size 5 or 6, I'll switch to Republic.

[player1]

I usually go into Repubic when I get enought luxuries (like 4 or 5).
But before that I rush to Monarchy.
I stay in monarchy (after having luxuries) only if I have to much units to upkeep, or I am waging a long war.

Personally I think that if luxuries would be a little less powerfull, that Governmant choices would be muxh more interesting.

[MadWombat]

My attitude is to wage my first early wars in despot for the pop rush, but then switch to Monarchy pretty fast; ie, as soon as I'm done with conquering. I do it MOSTLY for the growth rather than production bonuses. I then switch to Republic when my core cities are up around the 12 mark, and I hav most of my cities bigger than 6. Before that, I find myself paying too much maintainance to make it worthwhile.

I don't usually rush Democracy, I usually end up getting it from some other civ, mostly because there are better wonders/units to be had on other paths. When I DO get it, I switch ASAP, and then stay in Democacy until waging late game wars in Communism (which I also get from other civs).

[DrSpike]

I don't feel monarchy has much of a place in civ3, even on deity. Pop rushing is soooooo powerful, and by the time you don't want to rush anything else you have the tech for republic. What's more the optimal war-making period is either early on (when you're still in despot anyway) or in the late game (when commie is possible), so monarchy is rarely desirable IMO even from a warlike viewpoint.