I DID IT!!! I finally (third attempt) won a game on Prince. [Tiny, pangea, Ferderick. I had a good starting location and the best possible random neighbours: Asoka and Hattie. Ended up with Augustus score.]

Is it my imagination, or war weariness much worse at this level? What can be done to keep it at a reasonable level? especially earlier in the game?

I am trying again on a larger map. Are there any civs that are reliable allies? Ones that will be true friends throughout the game and never backstab you?

War weariness does seem worse on Prince. Not sure if it's an increased rate of unhappy per turn in war or just that you get less happy bonus from difficulty level.

Monarchy helps in early game. Just stock bigger cities with more (cheap) military units. Late game culture slider/jail/Mt. Rushmore and +happy wonders and/or police state.

Congrats on Prince win, btw :)

I concur--I believe one of the differences as you move up the levels is that unhappiness happens at smaller and smaller city sizes. War weariness only exacerbates it.

Religion can be a factor, too; citizens will refuse to "make war on our brothers and sisters of the faith". So if given the choice, it's best to choose an enemy with a different state religion. Or to switch your own well in advance and stop spreading the soon-to-become-your-enemy's one.

Also, war weariness is initially lessened if you are the victim of an aggressor, and if your territory was invaded, rather than the other way around. So if you can goad an enemy into attacking you, you'll have a longer grace period before you have to deal with it. Fight a defensive war at first while you build up a massive force. Then attack and achieve your objectives as quickly as possible.

And hey, if war weariness gets unmanageable, you could always do the wild and crazy thing and sue for peace.

Try war rotation. The war weariness is calculated for each AI you war. So, ending one will remove the war weariness for that AI. But starting another which you had not war before starts you with zero war weariness again.

Do be careful about warring a previous foe since the WW is going to come back from where you drop off with some decay as time passes.

Yes war weariness is a problem for me on Prince level since I play for domination victory and have to be at war nearly all the time. Sometimes there can be as many as 10 happiness points removed in a city due to war weariness. This can give 6 or 7 citzens not working in the city and decimate it's effectiveness. I don't have a cure.

One thing though, don't start a war against more than one tribe at a time. This can be really bad on war weariness.

Another thing to consider is establish peace for 10 turns, then war again as soon as you can. If your first attack gets enough of his resources destroyed, he won't be much stronger at the end of those 10 turns. Also gives you some time to consolidate and reinforce your troops for the final campaign. Basically splitting one long war into two shorter wars.

Yet another reason to knock out resources first!

Not sure how it compares to lower levels, but there are a couple of options/strategies for avoiding WW:
- Fight blitzkrieg style, i.e. never let the war drag on. If it takes more than, say, 10-20 turn (depending on game speed) you should seriously consider settling for peace, possibly extorting a tech in the process. Only let unhappies build up when you can remove the target completely within a reasonable timeframe. Keep in mind that WW will reset when the target is destroyed, so balance your options.
- As Dizzy said, soften up targets and settle for peace only to attack again after the 10 turns when you risk building up WW. It'll give you an edge over your target. Prepare a couple of mounted units for this very purpose; works like a charm.
- Avoid fighting more than one civ at a time, if possible. Keep an eye on defensive pacts (those indirectly killed me through WW a couple of times)
If you do get in a multi-civ war, kill the weakest one as soon as you can, if only to get rid of a part of the WW. Again, settle for peace if need be.
- Grab cities with happy resources or religions you do not possess FIRST! Simple enough but easily overlooked.
This is extra nice when you can grab a founding city or even religious shrine. Spread that religion ASAP when you do.
- The culture slider is your friend. The number of times I've forgotten to use the thing when it could've saved me numerous unhappies and thus sped up troop building is plain shameful. With theatres and colloseums in place even a mere 10% culture increase can mean life or WW death, in my experience.

Mind, I'm still amazed how the AW players pull it off (at any level)... WW in those games is just insane from what I've seen in SG's.