"What's the difference between the faction? Which is the best family?"

It barely matters. Family is largely about the story you get, not the benefits, though in my opinion, if I had to pick the best and worst, I'd say that

Killgannons - Have the easiest time pushing through tight votes, since honest gives you an absurdly good resting point for political parties.

Sant - Extra brainpower from EVERY school is a pretty

Shuskys - If you screw up your economy at the start, the emperor bails you out, but it costs you some negative traits. The Shuskys get to ask their family instead, which makes you quite wealthy.

Conservative Dudes - - Brainpower per school is kind of painful.


"I keep running out of city funds!"

There are two reasons you are going broke
1) You are not getting enough revenue
2) You are buying too many services.
3) Your taxes are not nigh enough.

Before you build anyhting else, you should slap down 3 districts with no upkeep or services what so ever. This will get people and businesses into your city, which means initial revenue. For the first little while, you'll still get negative money. Don't panic! New districts take a while to build up, and will drain your economy a little when you start.

Use this time to pass through a tax increase. Just push taxes as far as you can while still getting the majority of the votes (and maybe gently push the parties towards supporting your tax increase).

"How should I build these distrcits?"
This is what I've found works.

There's no reason not to cover every inch of your city in districts, so use every bit of space you can. That said, the game is somewhat finicky about the shape and size of discricts, so you may have to do a bit of figditing to use 99.5% of the available space (don't freak about losing tiny corners

I try and group districts together in groups of 4, and then place all the services (when I eventually add them) at the center of that square in easily grouped together so that the service coverage has the absolute maximum range. Don't worry if there's a little bit that isn't covered, it's not the end of the world.

OO
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You won't be able to get it uniform given terrain, but the basic idea is residential in two massive "blocks" in the center surrounded by industry and commerical zones with no services at all.

That said, it's REALLY not a big deal.

"What do you spend personal money on?"
I use every cent to promote services, myself, so I have to build as few as possible. It's basically a permenent bonus, and those are very very rare.

"How do I get votes to go my way?"
You don't. You can't change the opinion of political parties, you can only nudge them the tiniest bit.

The amount you "nudge" them is determined by how much good will you have, and using it costs a lot. Using it in a way that they really don't like may be effective (I.E. Demands and Threats), but it burns so much good will that it'll make further votes very difficult. The higher your goodwill, the more effective anything you do is.

For this reason, I strongly recommend bugging political parties only on votes that are very close and important to you. If there's some crazy thing you need to pass, use prestige. Don't try threats or demands unless the situation is desperate.

If you are utterly convinced you need to pass a vote that doesn't look like it's going to go your way, use a "plead" action on each party to ask them to vote for you as soon as the vote comes up. Then wait a month or two and plead them again.

"What's the best tech to research?"
They are all important. However, any ones that grant Institutions (which give city wide bonuses) are huge, and any ones that grant you buildings that give brain power (libraries

A very powerful strategy is to beeline University, which grants significant brain power and personal growth for your city. Get this (and maybe a vocational school) early, and you'll smash through the tech trees.

"What services do I build?"
As few as possible. The only exception is schools, since they indirectly increase taxes (by promoting social growth) and give you brainpower (which means more technology).

See, the key to this game is that making people more happy doesn't make the game easier, you just have to make them happy enough not to revolt/vote you out. There's no reason to build any services until your city has a serious problem. Insttutions are far better deals, since they raise everything.


"What infastructure do I build?"
In Era 1: None. Not worth it.
In Era 2: Density increases to improve your population.
Basically. infrastructure is a collosal waste of money until your people demand an improvement.

"What are my goals in Era 1?"
1- Develop a stable economy
2- Build ALL THE DISTRICTS
2- Build minimal services
4- Save a vatoad of money (100 million is doable) by era 2.
5- Build University and ALL THE INSTITUTIONS