Buildings

Farm

A Farm raises the food income of the city it stands in and raises that city's population cap by a step. Part of the income is fixed; the rest depends on location: every Fertile land tile in the city's region adds a share, counting at most 2 tiles.

What it does

Food finances two things: unit upkeep and population growth. A Farm eases both at once — you can grow your army while the city keeps growing too.

Food income is not affected by the population multiplier; the multiplier applies only to production (Economy).

The cap step makes the Farm a building for grown cities too: a city whose population has hit its cap grows again with a Farm (Cities and population). Almshouse gives the same kind of step; built together, the steps add up.

When to build it

• When army upkeep starts eating your income.
• In a city with Fertile land in its region: the Farm's location share only works there, and a city without fertile land gets just the fixed part. The region counts claimed tiles — where two cities' rings overlap, a shared tile is written to only one of them (Territory and score).
• Food is pooled empire-wide, and the surplus goes to your growth focus or to the lowest-population eligible city (Economy). Which city holds the Farm changes how much food you get, not where it goes.

A city holds at most 3 buildings (4 once its population reaches 3), and the building list is longer than that: a Farm shares every slot with the Workshop, the Market, the Walls and the Monument. It usually loses that contest on the border and wins it inland — and in an empire whose city quota is full, its rival for the slot is the Monument.

The numbers on this page are read from the game’s balance tables.