Is it worth building Gambling Halls etc for the economic benefit?

[Imhotep]

The stealth chain of buildings give the following economic advantages:

Sake den +100 wealth
Gambling hall +200 wealth
Criminal syndicate +350 wealth
Infamous mizu shobai district +25% prefecture tax rate

Is it worth upgrading to the higher levels of this chain purely for the economic advantages?

There can be only one Infamous prefecture for the +25% tax rate bonus, and one only really needs one Criminal Syndicate to recruit Kisho Ninja. The extra happiness is non-essential.

So is it worth upgrading Stealth buildings in all prefectures? How much is +100 prefecture wealth worth in taxes?

[Eddie G]

If you don't have anything else to spend your money on.... it does increase your taxable income, but is it worth the cost? I don't know.

[BastardSword]

In general not for me because they don't give a growth bonus. If I build a sake den I'll do so for the happiness bonus, this is useful in the early game. And I'll upgrade them to level 3 in the midgame when I have tons of cash anyway. After realm divide a sake den is useful just to get that quick happiness boost in provinces that you are taking over one after the other with high unhappiness due to "resistance to invaders."

But economically a market is much much better, you get more money per turn and you get more growth so you get more future money.

Mizu Shobai would be great to have for its tax bonus in a rich province like Omi, but it takes so long to research that by the time you unlock it, you probably don't have access to silk anyway, especially if you hit realm divide. Not worth the time investment that it requires. I don't like geishas for the same reason, it's very tricky to get them and then they get assassinated constantly anyway.

[Telvido_cat]

Economically not worth it GH is 1600k and earn you ~ 0.25 X 100 k / turn (normal tax / no metsuke). Take 64 turns to pay for itself and economy boost is minor. If you want kisho / Geisha then ofc you need high level in ninja province like said above (Omi, kii etc) but silk hard to get end game.

Edit: Mizou Shobai give +25% tax so this one building maybe worth it in rich province with metsuke.

[Young Erusean Officer]

You only upgrade farms and stop at sake dens from provinces you do not recruit from.

[markeason]

I always go for the Infamous District in one of my wealthy provinces, the additional income generation is good. The best place to build it is somewhere like Omi because, coupled with the Burakumin Village upgrade to the Mountain Hideout, you will be able to recruit level 4 ninja.

This is a big help for anyone that has problems keeping their agents alive.

Other than that for that one building, I wouldn't bother upgrading sake dens elsewhere.

[Edit: Also, if you are first to build it, which I find is always the case as the AI doesn't seem to prioritise it (perhaps the Hattori would if they survived long enough), then you gain a bonus 5% to ALL ninja actions - which is always good to have].

[Sn3z]

The Sake den(subsequent chains) + high tax rate is the reason to build them more than markets, since you would want to standardised PO everywhere, however since growth techs are very far down the tech tree and infrastructure provides very little growth, buying into the sake den chain is a hard sell past the T1, in every province you need a sake den + market to offset growth and for every province thats not really practical, you also run into food problems.

Buddhist temples might actually be better than sake Dens for standardizing PO + monks and your getting research to get down to the growth techs.