Taking an AI's Captiol

Hello Fellow Die Hard Civ 5 Fans:

I have asked a similar question in the past but under which situations would you take an AI's capitol. If you plan to only build 4 cities and focus on that to manage your cities better but you really want to take our Gandhi or Bismark but then you get their Capitol which then gives you another city etc.

If you are shooting for Domination Victory then you will need to take all Capitols to win? but will adding two or three more Capitols really set you back in game play?

Which are your following reasons to Knock Out An AI's Capitol?

Thanks

Brew God

If I'm not doing domination, my main motivation for taking an AI capital is juicy wonders. I was playing one game recently where Egypt was right next to me. I was going for a culture victory, but he had just... so many wonders, including both Colossus and Petra as well as Leaning Tower. It was too much, I couldn't resist.

- if the civ has a number of cities and the warmongering hit for taking the capitol is not too bad
- if it has any wonders at all or is otherwise juicy
- if going for CV and I just can't surpass this guy
- if it'll help me get a good peace deal so that in fact I get two cities for one warmongering hit
- if it's end game and I don't really care about warmongering, or I've got good tourism over him and taking it won't hurt me much

AI Capital's are normally their best cities. (Just like its normally the human's best city). So as long as you don't get into a war of attrition trying to take their capital, it will help. As always puppet initially and wait until some time after it comes out of resistance to annex.

Yes, the only way in BNW to win domination is to personally own all original capitals. (In G&K and vanilla you merely had to be the only one left with their original capital)

When not seeking a domination victory, sometimes an annoying AI needs to be forced into an involuntary OCC. [Take their capital but let them keep a useless city to avoid extreme warmonger penalty]

None domination...if you can take a juicy capital without a diplomatic penalty.e.g. not friends with someone you don't want to annoy or not going to get a significant warmonger penalty then why not?!
Heading into the middle of the game at least it's just a pre built well developed city to add to your empire where a lot of the time you will probably get extra happiness from added luxuries and good likelyhood of happiness buildings left in the city with a decent population and decent infrastructure already in place.

I only take out an enemy Capitol if it numbers within my target number of cities and it is very close to my borders if I am not playing for a Domination Victory. However, I will DoW an AI to kill a Settler he wanders near my Borders after he refuse my Request Not to be Settled Near. Likewise, I am not above using my first Low/No Impact DoW to steal a Worker from a nearby AI (and later declare peace) as it shifts the AI Leader into Unit Spam Mode and they end up looking like a Warmonger to other Civs we meet later for their apparently unprovoked aggression

Ai capitals become very important for a domination victory. Taking any other cities that are on the way to the next civilization's capital is also a good way to easily keep your units healed easier while you're on your way to the next capital.