Building cities

Pontifex711#9147

I just started playing and the main thing I am not sure is how to build up cities. Do I want to build farms (beyond what is needed to feed population) or build commerce/industry for gold?
And what does it mean when you do sell food (which gives you negative in the city) but your faction overall is positive? Is that city doing good or starving and will it affect the city if you leave or best to convert it?

Rewan#2358

TBF : I think it vastly depends of your playstyle. There is no "correc"t answer for this.

- You need the food to trade it with other factions early game and grow up your cities in the mid/late game.

- You need Commerce AND Industry to rake in income yourself. (Overall I feel Commerce as the best source of income but I don't have the maths to back it up so for now it's just a feeling)

- Overall scratch Peasantry unless you are going with a blitzkrieg campaign. (And then Tax Collector becomes your best friend because rebellions are sorta easily circumvented)

The only build I will tell you to ABSOLUTELY. NEVER. build is the food markets as the cost is not balanced for the benefits. (One at tier 3 is fine sometimes, but never go tier 4 or 5)


If your commandery is in the negative but your faction is positive there are no drawbacks. If your faction is negative, your reserves are going to deplete and your armies and cities will starve leading to severe public order problems.

Vin362#6699

For food I generally focus on production rather then selling as more food is always a good thing as you use the surplus of food to upgrade cities even if the city has negative income and a faction wide positive leads to having supplies while matching through friendly territories. As to your question about a city with negative food production you will sufferer a drop in public order which you can either counter with administrative buildings or a garrison (a red military building) or you can take advantage of the public order drop to get revolts by building a tax office. The other effect of negative food for a city is it lowers its reserves during sieges but this is something that shouldn't be too much of a problem if you have commanderies that can raise an army to save the city under siege.

As for gold income it is always best to take a look at what the settlements in your commanderies have to decide to go down a commerce, industry or peasantry route.

Pontifex711#9147

I did figure it was variant and probably a little bit of all.

I started with Cao Cao who has a ton of food which is good for trading but as I wipe out peoples, I have less to trade partners

But you did answer my question about the negative, which I had figured. Thanks

Vikingstyle2021#8159

City build up depends on province resources.

If you have farmlands go for the green building tree in the city. If you have a port go for blue/purple and if you have an iron ore or tool workshop go for the purple industry buildings.

Always always build the purple building that gives industry income and reduces corruption. Once you expand a lot corruption can become nasty.

Next to that i always build a garrison building in every city. This is just a personal preference and not necessary but i like a decent garrison, the public order boost it gives and additional reserves.

EmeraldThanatos#7267

City building is one of my favorite aspects of Three Kingdoms. It depends on what the subregions of a province are, in Changsha you will want to focus almost exclusively on commerce. But a province like taiyuan is best suited for industry.

Vandicus

Commerce and industry vary a little by settlement, but commerce tends to have better upgrade buildings for it. You want to build farming provinces to maximize food production(the % food buildings especially, the flat food production buildings are more optional). Since to be effective you want a bunch of multipliers in a well developed city for income, you don't really have to focus on developing cities that are food oriented. Cities get walls at tier 4(so basically this is the minimum you want to build to), an extra building slot for not too much food cost at 5, and then at a fair bit of additional cost another slot at 7 and 8.

Population gives % bonus to all income, city tier gives % bonus to commerce income. The buildings give much higher % bonuses to commerce, but base income commerce is relatively scarcer.

Pontifex711#9147

Thanks guys, I know it's late. But I've slowly figured this out on my own as I played and watched some streamers...

LESAMA said:

Always always build the purple building that gives industry income and reduces corruption. Once you expand a lot corruption can become nasty.

About this.... I noticed I get corruption pretty heavily- perhaps expanding too fast. I did not initially build it because I didn't have industry and it takes me away to get this building....
My question is: what is the best way to counter corruption? If you build this earlier on, will it ripple effect and prevent extra corruption as you expand?

Rewan#2358

Stack the Industrial building, it gives income, corruption reduction in the province it's built in and corruption reduction in the adjacent provinces. It may be making "less" than the regular Industrial building but as you expand its value gradually takes over (corruption also jumps faster in harder difficulties) so essentially it's a "scaling into lategame" building. The more you expand, the more valuable that building becomes.