How Do You Deal With Bullies?

For the time being I tend to go for Science/Culture wins, and I hate going to war unless somebody is really enriching on my borders OR they are so weak I do not have to use much resources building units and can keep to the plan.

However, in my last game, Sweden was pain in the ass.
Frist, he was on a different continent...he settled on the far far west coast of my super continent...not too big a deal for me since he neighbored Russia not me.

Then, he took over the civ on his continent, then he built a bunch of citadels and took over Russia.
He never attached me, but he was at the very least annoying and moreover, made it hard to overtake him culturally.

Again I tend to try and stay out of wars because I hate having to loss trade routes, re-build cargo ships, and get warmongering points when I need good trade/relations.
But man, I never should have let Sweden get so powerful.
How do you all handle these problem civ?

Take a look at my map attached..I am the white Civ with the blue dots.
Sweden is the blue civ with yellow dots.

War is part of the game, particularly on higher levels. You don't need to get warmonger penalties. Those really only come into play when you take cities, and if you are friends with the people the bully is targeting, they will give you a diplo bonus for fighting a common enemy. You can take out his units, pillage improvements, steal workers, plunder trade routes. None of these things give you big warmonger penalties. You can even take a strategic city and puppet it. Taking capitols or lots of cities gets you labeled a warmonger. You can do a lot to slow down a bully without committing to a wholesale domination strategy.

If he's been that aggressive it's quite likely the other AI dislike him too. I'd recommend an alliance for war so that you aren't fighting alone. And yes, some games war is unavoidable with aggressors. On Deity in particular there are many AI that will attack you very early for no good reason. They are just programmed to be more aggressive.

I count 11/11 coastal cities. Head straight for the cap and then liberate Russia after to balance out. She won't be an issue because of her reduced efficiency, she'll love you forever and will vote for you in the WC, and people will love you for the liberation bonus. Sweden will be vastly defeated, and if you take more cities in peace talks, you can gift them to people who dislike you if you still need diplo bonuses. AI is terrible with naval combat, so just use a big fleet, it'll be simple enough and will drastically reduce his culture. Be sure to remember moving all great works out of the cities you gift away and to sell as many buildings as you can first.

In my current game i liberated a few cities, but the owner denounced me right after. Not sure why you say they will love me forever.

It's a big bonus to relations with that civ but in BNW it no longer guarantees they'll love you, just that they vote for you in WC and for world leader. It is a large diplo modifier though. However, if you have a big enough negative influence with them it won't reverse that. The AI probably will love being liberated here though because I'm guessing they were on good or neutral relations when she got wiped out so it'll be all positive influence after liberation.

MightySpice said:

In my current game i liberated a few cities, but the owner denounced me right after. Not sure why you say they will love me forever.

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This has also happened to me. If you weren't on the best of terms with a Civ before you liberated them, they might still not like you. If they see you as a warmonger (even after liberating them), they will denounce you.

Ungrateful sods!!

inthesomeday said:

Be sure to remember moving all great works out of the cities you gift away and to sell as many buildings as you can first.

Click to expand...

-Great tip!

The pain in the butt was when I finally dow'd Sweden, he had so many military units it was very long and tedious fighting him and hard to keep track of who was at which point on the map that I wasn't as efficient, losing some battles if I'd been more aware of I would have won. I think I'll try and prevent any civ from getting that big again.