I've seen a number of posts about stealing workers, killing settlers, etc. and I am interested to know how many players make it part of their strategy to go to war early in the game with a simple objective like that. (in single-player)

I postpone war until I've built up an army (even with an early UU), and go after cities to get land or to weaken the AI. So it takes a long time to prepare, and becomes a major part of my overall game strategy. I don't fight 'little' wars mostly for diplomatic reasons, but also because I like to be sure I have the army to meet the objective.

So I would like to hear from players who are more opportunistic with war--
how often do you fight minor wars?
how does it affect diplomacy?
how effective is it on higher levels?

Any remarks will be appreciated.

Its actually rather effective, though I usually go for a more conventional war of conquest.

The heart of the strategy is that you declare war when you can grab a worker uncontested. Then you walk into the AIs land and fortify yourself on favorable terrain. This puts the AI in war mode, which hurts their growth, and you gain a worker at their expense.

However you should be prepared to follow up this initial assault by eventually taking your neighbor over. Since early in the game you cannot gain technologies for peace treaties there is little reward for calling off the dogs. And the AI is likely never going to be friendly with you again after such a backstab.

I play on Prince/Monarch depending on how challenged I want to be any given day. Works at both levels.

I remember in one game I wound up doing this by accident.

Monty (surprise, surprise) declared war on me very early on. I had a Warrior exploring near his territory. I moved him in and fortified him on a forested hill two tiles from Monty's capital--on the very edge of the fat cross.

This drove him NUTS. Probably because the AI is programmed to never send a Worker out of a city if there's an enemy unit in the fat cross like that. He sent unit after unit (Warriors then Archers) out to try to dislodge my Warrior, who survived, accumulated promotions, and just got stronger and stronger. It also kept Monty out of my territory and cost him a lot of units while I built a real attack force. The Warrior reached Level 4 (yay! Heroic Epic) before he finally fell to a Jaguar. By then, I had a stack of Axemen just outside of his borders.

I don't usually declare war that early on, but if I'm on the receiving end, I've used this tactic again. Most of the AIs are very reluctant to war that early though, so I haven't done it too many times.

I used to use this tactic a lot, but I've learned that in Monarch games you have to be careful. On levels where the AI starts getting more free units, you should make sure you have a defensive unit in your capital before trying it. Otherwise you could steal a worker only to lose the game when their scouting archer, who just happened to be near your capital, comes waltzing in (happened to me). It is still a very good tactic to use, though. You basically paralyze the target city for a long time and gain a free worker (no turns lost in either production or growth), all for the cost of one warrior. Cost/benefit analysis = YES!

I haven't done this before but having read the posts above it's something I'm going to start doing. It's likely to work better if you start with a warrior who you send out exploring (and worker-napping) while building another warrior in your capital.
You'll almost certainly find yourself at war with your neighbour so the sooner the better. Pinching their worker and forcing them into war mode is going to slow down their expansion significantly (coz they won't be building settlers or improving terrain).
If you can get their worker back to your capital then you don't have to build a worker yourself meaning you can go straight to settler building to start on copper/horse city for the initial rush to take out your (weakened) neighbour.
I'm currently playing at Prince level.
Diplomatically if you're going for early war against a neighbour you'll get the penalty with other civs anyway. This ain't a big deal coz open borders is of dubious benefit during the early game and you can't tech trade until alphabet by which time you should be at war regardless.

When playing on hish difficulties (i play emperor for now... im on a run for a 1500 domination win, i think next time i'll try immo) AI starts game with many military units + 1 (or 2!) worker + 1 settler.
Loosing 18 or 23 turns to produce your worker leaves you far behind : you will be late for early expansion (so your second city would probably not be as good as you wanted).
The concept of early war is simple : if I steal some of the AI workers/settlers I will suppress their advantages. spendind 11 turn to produce a warrior that will bring back a worker definitively seems more attractive.

Well there are drawbacks too : your attacked neighboor will probably dislike you, begining with a -3 : 'you declared war on us'. this -3 looks little, but this means you are the primary target for this civ.
the immediate consequence is that this civ is also YOUR primary target : using your first units to pillage the improvement already built and chop axemen to take their capital (probably taking their second city first to get a few xp). thisway, building ONLY military units, you will get 1, 2 or 3 worker (depending on how many settlers you intercepted), 2 capital sites (which is better than 1 capital + 1 good city), 1 less opponent and a good military start (something like 5 axeman, most of them with >10xp).
What if you dont get copper ? you can manage the same thing if you have horses with charriot (? dont know the english name :/), with queshua its even easier (AI believes in archer : you get the cheappest archer killer when incas), and some other UU (the earlier ones).
What if you dont get copper nor horses and dont have a good UU ? well just pillage them and then flee their lands : they will propose peace a few turns later, converting to their religion can cancelled the -3 dipolomatic malus.

to conclude, never steal a worker from an aggressive nor creative civilisation : aggresive because you will find it much harder to crush them, creative because they will get a +20% or +40% cultural bonus to defense. Take also time to consider the UU of the targeted civ (if playing with horses, do not attack the greeks !)

most has been said, about worker robbery here
but since i'm one that mentions it very often, i feel i must had something:

it's very much level dependent

on lower levels (up to prince afaik), it almost an exploit
it's so easy and hurts your target so much that you feel you're cheating
In fact, you should build more than 1 warrior, and no worker at all :)

on monarch+, well read above, ese-aSH said it all:
you can go on worker robbery, but think of it as a real act of war, meaning, you'll have to rush that neighbour soon, since there will never be peace.

@cabert : on lower lvl its an exploit simply because AI doesnt starts with that extra worker ! and by the time it build one its cultural defenses should have grown so far you wont event see the worker =] (and anyway you obviously DONT NEED their workers to win)
Isometime manage to entertain good relationship with my early ennemy, gandhi and massa are simple peacefull guys =]

last point I didnt mention : you migth have to wait a few for the AI worker because AI cheats but still cant build improvement until it gets the appropriate tech. Dont expect a religious leader to build a mine or a farm at the very start of the game, be patient and just wait near that gold ressource ;)

@cabert : on lower lvl its an exploit simply because AI doesnt starts with that extra worker ! and by the time it build one its cultural defenses should have grown so far you wont event see the worker =] (and anyway you obviously DONT NEED their workers to win)
Isometime manage to entertain good relationship with my early ennemy, gandhi and massa are simple peacefull guys =]


obviously you wanted to say it's not an exploit on lower levels

sending a warrior near the first or even second city of any AI opponent up to prince is like disallowing them any improvements until you come and cut their heads of.

I tried at prince and built myself 2 very weak targets, for axe rushes.
it's definetely very easy to get yourself 2 more capitals, with no risk at all.

The ability to get them is ok, but the lack of risk makes me feel bad about it.

You can even grab more than 1 worker from an AI at those lower levels, since they accept peace for nothing after about 10 turns.

As i said, i built 3 warriors, and no worker at all.



last point I didnt mention : you migth have to wait a few for the AI worker because AI cheats but still cant build improvement until it gets the appropriate tech. Dont expect a religious leader to build a mine or a farm at the very start of the game, be patient and just wait near that gold ressource ;)

100% ok with you

hm taking a worker past 2500BC is never an exploit anyway, i meant 'early worker stealth' is an exploit, just because they dont have one (or it is too far to be caugth :p)

I usually play on crownded maps (current : pangea normal low sea lvl and 9 starting civs : some capitals only have 6 square between each other) that make the game easier, I have never tried early war on huge maps, I guess its harder (but my computer really dislike huge maps :o).
In my current game I think I only build 1 worker (just after my warrior) and yet I have 12 of them.

Its the elementary reason : 'Why loosing time on something the AI can *offer* me'. This work for workers and for techs ! (NEVER eliminte a civ that still have some techs to offer, no matter if you exchange gunpowder just to get fishing).

(NEVER eliminte a civ that still have some techs to offer, no matter if you exchange gunpowder just to get fishing).

hmm
i'd rather kill'em all :lol:
often when i sued for peace, gaining a few techs on the deal, it led me to a muddy halt, giving them time to recover and time for others to jump in

hey cabert I just realize that stealing worker is the key to the enigma in your signature ;)

hey cabert I just realize that stealing worker is the key to the enigma in your signature ;)

now i'll have to change it;)

how often do you fight minor wars?

Every game.

how does it affect diplomacy?

Not at all. The other civs haven't even met the one you declare on, so there will be no penalty for "declaring war on our friend". As for the victim of the war, diplomacy is irrelevant because you'll kill them soon anyway (they should be the first victim of your real war).

how effective is it on higher levels?

You practically can't win without it. The AIs start with so much stuff at Immortal and Deity that you can't compete unless you steal some of that stuff for yourself.

hm taking a worker past 2500BC is never an exploit anyway, i meant 'early worker stealth' is an exploit, just because they dont have one (or it is too far to be caugth :p)

I think your problem is that you don't understand the meaning of exploit. From your (relatively rare) spelling mistakes, i gather that you probably speak French. Exploit in English is not at all the same thing as exploit in French. In French, exploit = feat in English, as in "wow, that's quite a feat!" Exploit in English is the same as a cheat ("tricher"), except that an exploit works within the game system while a cheat works around it. An exploit is using a weakness in the game or the AI to gain an advantage, in a way that was probably not anticipated and countered by the game developpers.

As for your earlier remark ("i don't know what the word is for charriot in English"), well, you know it even though you don't know that you know it! The English equivalent of the word "charriot" is "charriot"!

The English equivalent of the word "charriot" is "charriot"!

yeah, but just one 'r'

Chariot.

Good ideas here. Thanks to all who responded. :goodjob:

I was wondering about the R's. Thanks for correcting me!

Un charriot? Comment dit-on "pillage"? Pillager? :)

If you have an awsome opportunity, take it. But I ussually dont go war mongering until I have few big cities.

Un charriot? Comment dit-on "pillage"? Pillager? :)

On dit "piller", je crois (http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?l=p&p=17). Mais je suis Américain; prennez-le avec beaucoup de sel.

On dit "piller", je crois (http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?l=p&p=17). Mais je suis Américain; prennez-le avec beaucoup de sel.

what is salt doing here?

et oui, le verbe est "piller", le substantif est "pillage", comme en anglais
je pense d'ailleurs que c'est un mot français adopté en anglais:eek:

Félicitations VoiceOfUnreason pour la syntaxe parfaite, et l'orthographe impeccable!

@zombie : yep, but 'chariot' is just 'char' in french :p (the same work for chariot and tank !)

anyway yuo were right I didnt event take time to think, *exploit* is what we call in french 'un faux ami' : a word that is strictly the same, but does not mean the same thing :o

You practically can't win without it. The AIs start with so much stuff at Immortal and Deity that you can't compete unless you steal some of that stuff for yourself.

This is not true.

@zombie : yep, but 'chariot' is just 'char' in french :p (the same work for chariot and tank !)

In France yes, but not in Quebec, because here "char" is the most commonly used word for car, so it would be a bit confusing. Charriot also works (e.g. un charriot égyptien) and is much less confusing.

As for tanks, we call them tanks, for the same reason (it would be too confusing otherwise). Char d'assaut can also be used, but tank is preferable.

You wouldn't use "bagnole" or "caisse" for tanks and chariots, would you? Same for us, we don't use "char" for those.

See the table in the middle of this page for proof : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quebec_French_lexicon

"Char - Car - In Europe, a char is an army tank or a chariot."

I was wondering about the R's. Thanks for correcting me!

Heh...you're welcome. I'm an editor. I can't help it ;).

In Civ. III I'd do a quick rush. I'd set up 2-3 more cities. Either build Immortals(I loved Persia) or whatever else I had. Then take out 1 or 2 civs. (preferably weak ones) I'd then become ultra-peaceful, and expand into what would have been their territory. I'd take a long time to consolidate it but would emerge very powerful. Then I'd usually do a cavalry rush followed by a tank rush. i'd end up the dominant civ and easily dispose of the 2-3 remaining civs.

This was on huge and a pretty low level. I started Civ when I was pretty young and inexperienced.

Now I do very aggressive settling. Take a lot more land than all my rivals. Keep a nominal deterence force and industrialize. Then I take a shot at my rivals whenever I see an opportunity, especially with Jihads :)

I do this every game. I play on Monarch. there is no risk.

I go to a fairly far civ. if they have a worker on their border I take it and run them back to my capital. No harm no foul.