How many civilian factories should you build in the early part of the game?

[MossRock42]

This is bound to be different for each country, but how many civilian factories should you have to be able to be industrialized enough to compete? When do you switch over to mils?

[Kirby]

Depends on the country and when you go to war, but rule of thumb for me is. 39' war start building mils in 37'. If at 41' then 39'. As Germany you can civ greed a bit until 38'.
Or another way is to see when you can go on at least partial mob is a good point to start building mils.

[Maya-Neko]

There's not really a fixed number, but mostly depends on the circumstances, especially when playing non-historical and your decisions on when you want to start wars.

Overall i'm more into preparing more, so i often end up going into war with big nations in like 40+, so with germany for example i often build civilians up to like 38, maybe early 39 (with some early military factories to get the plane production running)

[Shrek_UA]

Heavily depends on the country, like for Germany you should build civs only up to 38 and then rush mils while as USA you should start off with mils and maybe build a few civs in case you need more later. As Soviets I would've reccomended to build civs also up to 38-39 (if historical focus is on) and then rush mils as well and there is no really certain anwser on this for every country

[Bored Peon]

I just kinda build according to the states.
5 slots 3 civilian 2 military
6-8 (as above) but the second row is refinery or dockyards.
10 slots (5 civilian and 5 military) or (3/2 as 5 slot, with 5 dockyards)

You kinda need to have a good balanced split for many reasons
- Repair
- Quick build of rails and hubs or defenses
- Trading for materials
- Maintaining a decent balance so consumer goods does not eat up your military factories or dockyards.
Most countries I play I have to trade for @#$%loads of steel and aluminum. So I always try to keep a bit extra civilian factories.

If you ever play the long game (ie past 1950) then you probably understand most territories the AI has is ALL military factories. Which basically unless you have the resources to fuel them they become useless. Even then once you hit about 200 military factories you are producing more @#$% than you will probably use.

The new market system helps a bit with building now by selling convoys, trains, and old planes.

[MossRock42]

Is it worth to build infrastructure before civs? Does it give enough of a bonus to construction times to be worth it?

[Kirby]

Originally posted by MossRock42:

Is it worth to build infrastructure before civs? Does it give enough of a bonus to construction times to be worth it?

I don't think so unless that region has some decent amount of resources as well.

[Bored Peon]

Originally posted by MossRock42:

Is it worth to build infrastructure before civs? Does it give enough of a bonus to construction times to be worth it?

It depends if you completed your focus tree or not.
It also depends if you were given a timed bonus (like Finland)

If you completed your focus and are running Construction Engineering, then yes.

Also keep in mind level of infrastructure affects all building and the amount of supplies in the area. Nearby fighting usually reduces it by 1 level.

Maxing infrastructure also gives you extra building slot for 100 PP as well. For some countries those extra slots make a big difference.

[Abacus]

eventually you get the idea of what you will need for your objectives.

you can also look at what the "biggest' countries start with and that will give an idea of what is a large start.

If you want to play a minor nation, Road to 56' really helps as it give focus tree's that are more advanced then the generic one's. So that you can compete.

one thing imo that best suits a country...play it over and over, stop half way if need be and start over. you eventually get a feel of what the country can do, and what it's hard limits are.

Remember one of the best way of getting factories is taking over another nation's.

[Bored Peon]

Originally posted by Dunked on you:

Remember one of the best way of getting factories is taking over another nation's.

Speaking of which I forgot a use...
Spies doing collaboration require 15 factories. If you only have 20 or so that can easily disrupt a bunch of trades. However it does pay off in the long run because you get faster access to non-core manpower and factories.