Dif level and no cost to build settlements?

are you changing the AI difficulty level or the world difficulty?  these are 2 different things.

I put both on ridiculous

wow, even in beta 4 that was pretty tough... don't know what to say then.  i haven't played the final yet, gonna wait until tomorrow when the day 0 patch is released.  i advise waiting until then and try it again.

I think it is by design. While the settlement is free, you need to produce pioneer (the price could have been higher) and protect it with units. Those units for protection cost money to, more over, they consume money per turn. So, unless there is some resource, there is no reason to build settlement, even if it is free.

The resources, however are quite rare - you need to find them, clean up monsters around, and protect from somebody else making the settlement first. In some sense the price of the settlement is not when you settle, but in everything else.

I'm pretty sure the "royalty" class on sovereigns is allied globally to all your cities. 

No i dont think that the settlements are supposed to be free, coz one of the factions has as perk that settlements cost less.

Well that just relies on players being "nice and playing by the intended rules"..
That wont happen. Players will just spam pioneers nonstop and cover the entire lands in cities. Because why whouldnt they?
Even if there is no resource nearby, even if its just a plot of empty land, a lvl 1 city can still produce +1 materials, gold, knowledge and magic. With no upkeep (as far as i can see).

That definetly must change. As it is now its almost like Galciv2 (before the change) early colony rush, where all you did was colonize planets as quickly as possible, THEN worry about building them up

Infinite city sprawl is definitely an issue as it stands for the following reason

Cities are net producers of resources (otherwise with one city people would have problems)

The cost for building them is small (a single pioneer)

There is no major downside for losing them.

so a feasible strategy is to build as many pioneers as possible, and use each of these suburbs to produce peasants as quickly as possible.

Thx for the replys guys.

I do think that settlements should cost as they did in the beta. Its just more fun that way, and i hate the idea of pumping out pioneers to massproduce cities.

I agree indeed. I love this game, but the city spamming I can't stand. Cities all over the place is not fun. It gives to much micromanagement, and it ruins the atmosphere of the map, a fantasygame needs alot of wilderness, and the wilderness part of Elemental can be so much fun.

Stardock has to make building a new city a huge investment. Let it cost at least 400 G to found a new one, and raize the cost for every new city. Also make the AI don't build their cities so tight.

I would not go so far, but how about second city 100g then 200g then 400g etc?

I would like to see a Resource cost for founding a city (50 gold, 50 Material, 10 Metal) and a Mataince fee per city that goes up by the number of cities you have (First city costs 1 gold per turn, 2nd costs 3, 3rd costs 6, 4th costs 10, fifth costs 15, etc...).  I believe this would slow down expantion and stop city spamming.

Sammual

wait, in beta 4 each city that you had beyond your first had an increasing upkeep.  every city you built started to cost more and more gold per turn.  has this not translated to the final game?

The AI is supposed to be better today after the day 0 patch. I'm sure Brad will keep tweaking the AI until it is excellent. I agree, currently it is far to easy.

I always take royalty - it gives all your cities a +1 prestige bonus which lets you rush population and get the world improvements first. The sov's location makes no difference for it.

I feel this is a huge step forward from Gal Civ 2 - once brad gets the AI working well that is.

I agree there should be a cost for building a settlement - might actually stop the AI from spamming cities over every square inch of the map too.

It might be back in with the day 0 patch but the interm patch or the CD build removed it.  I will check when I get home.

Sammual

they need to re-introduce the cost of cities. They removed the city costs at the same time they reduced your starting gold (you used to start with 500! then it went down to 100. <: )

It would have been near-impossible to get a second city up if it cost 400 gold. I think a mix of materials and gilder is the best way to do it.

50-25, for your second city. Each city after that costs an additional 50 Gilder (but no more materials). Unless a city covers a location of particular military position, 50-25 + cost for pioneers + cost of protection should more-or-less balance out the 1 gold, 1 material, 1 arcane, 1 tech you can get in return. If you "rushed" your second city, then tried to make your third city actually "good" then you'd have to shell out 100-25 for it... something that could take a bit of time.

Some sort of added cost does seem appropriate.  I don't know if it should be gildar only, or materials, or some combination.  Or maybe Pioneers should get progressively more costly.