Quote Originally Posted by MCM View Post
What does this have to do with upgrading Markets? Upgrading castles is a question of spending money/food on military. Upgrading markets is a question of money/food for money. This sounds like an argument against upgrading Markets, that you think you need to food for Castle upgrades. Fine, that's all the less reason to upgrade Markets. You have better things to use the food and gold on.

But this is not an argument in favor of upgrading Markets. The Global Town Growth factor is the same whether you are at 0 food or 60 food. It is a marginal change every time you decide to upgrade a Market.

Just looking at your example, if you had "less than 4 upgraded markets" and were at -2 food... you would have been at +1 food if you had upgraded ZERO markets!

If I am at TWO FOOD, whether or not I upgrade a Market is the same maths question if I am at two hundred food. It is spending X gold to get Y wealth and lose Z town growth. How much you have had to upgrade your castles is irrelevant.
The point of my post wasn't pro-castle or pro-market, my point was summarized in the last phrase: Most likely you'll end up with very little food surplus. It's true that I went to negative food and would have been at positive if I hadn't upgraded markets, but on the other hand this was largely because of my rapid expansion west as Takeda, to provinces with rice exchanges (that I destroyed) and huge castles.

"Don't ever upgrade markets" is just as foolish order as "always upgrade markets."