Should this be happening?

from GalCiv2 Forums
Every time I start a new game for some reason my population just decreases and decreases with nothing I can do about it and my economy fails because of it and in the end the game is unwinnable. Is it because I expand too rapidly (I expand quite quickly) is this just some sort of horrible bug? Is there something I should be doing? Please help.
5,822 views 10 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Heh. By the way you're describing it, you're making it sound like this begins to happen at turn 1.

If that's the case, all I can do is giggle because I have no idea what you could be doing to cause that -- besides the obvious way of launching transport/colonies.
Reply #2 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Sounds like you are expanding too quickly. Also, perhaps you set your tax rate too high? If your approval rating drops too low population starts dropping with each turn. Try to keep the approval rating in the green for the begining of the game by keeping the tax rate low.

Just a guess.
Galactic Civilizations IV
Reply #5 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Bear in mind that each colony ship you launch will take that many people from your starting planet, and also that newly established planets have low polulation at first, and thus will cost more to keep up than you will get from them.
Reply #7 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Also, don't build too many farms unless you build at least an equal number of entertainment structures. In fact, if you're building more than one farm it's best to have more entertainment structures than farms. High populations lower moral.
Reply #8 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I have a bug like this

sudenly my aprouval rate falls to 1% and it doens't move even if I put the tax rate to 10 %
forced to start a new game because aof multiple rebellions
Reply #9 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
You have to keep your approval rating at minimum 35%. Lower than that and your population actually shrinks instead of grow, which means less taxable income. I personally try to keep it around 55% early game and 80% late game.

There are two main reasons for your approval to drop:

1) Taxes are too high - Usually unless you have a lot of entertainment infrastructure you can't raise taxes above 49% without suffering the huge approval hit that tucky mentioned. (I don't believe it's a bug.)

2) The planets have gotten too crowded - If the individual planet has a high population its approval naturally drops. Build entertainment centers to compensate (and research the morale techs). Or build troop transports to ferry people from your overpopulated planets to your not-so-populated ones. Just remember to not to exceed the food capacity of the new planet.

Now, if you're suffering from not-enough-cash so you have to pump taxes really high, there's several solutions to that too:

1) Stop expanding for the time being. Wait several turns. You get tax income based on your planets' populations. The populations start out small but grow .2b per turn until they hit the food cap, unless your approval rating is too low. Stop building Colony Ships for the moment and build Scouts or nothing instead.

2) Convert some of your planets into Economic Planets. Build enough farms to raise your population (I find that 1-2 on a PQ 10 is sufficient) without making things so that you have to replace every other tile with an entertainment center. Fill in the rest of the space with 1 spaceport (optional), 1 manufacturing center (necessary), and the rest Markets or Econ Capitals.

3) Trade. Build Freighters (custom ones with huge amounts of life support) and send them to foreign planets on the other side of the map. Pick their economic planets with huge populations. Then build economic starbases near your planets. Try to cover as much of the trade routes into the starbase's radius as possible, and preferably have 2 or more of your planets also within that radius. Then, as long as you're generating a surplus, construct the production improvements. If you start to get negative cash flow, build the trading modules. Build more starbases and trade modules as necessary.

4) Sell your techs. You can tech like mad and then sell them to the other players to finance your growth. Assuming you don't have problems staying ahead tech-wise.

Congratulations if you finished reading this. Good luck.
Reply #10 from Stardock Forums Top
Thanks people, I see now I've been putting taxes too high. Just played a game keeping them mainly on low and had no problems, thanks!