Ooh! That takes the biscuit, Saudi Arabia!

Ok, so I`m playing the game, just going into the Medieavel era. I`m friends with Saudi Arabia. There are a few other factions around, but England is right next door to me.

After a little while I notice that Elizabeth of England was being a bit shirty with me, "Yes?" she says as I try to do a trade which failed. Next turn I found out why as she made an unprovoked attack on me with some excuse about `Our close borders.`

This caught me completely by surprise and I lost the first city she attacked. I asked my friend Saudi arabia for help, but he said regretfully, no. After a touch and go battle I quickly retook my city, then, with newly recruited troops, marched on London in vengeance. I took London, then turned and marched on York.

Elizabeth was panicking now, frequently asking for peace, but I was not letting her off that easy.

York, her last and only city, was on the sea coast. I took my time and surrounded it on land with archers, 2 catapults, spearmen and a swordsman unit, then calmly pelted her city to 0 defences... I noticed Saudi Arabia`s military forces coming up behind mine around York too. Next turn, I would walk into York.

On the next turn Saudi Arabia did a Naval attack on York and took it by the sea, right under my nose in the turn I was going to take it! I did ALL the work and he snatched the final city from me! I also wanted to see Elizabeth`s defeated screen too- robbed!

I paused for a few moments in shock, then considered attacking Saudi Arabia. This was technically an act of war in my view, no matter how much Arabia smiled. That was crafty beyond craftyness.

I`m still considering attacking them now.

Arabia made you a huge favor.

That York was probably not worth much. Plus the way that warmonger formula works, you'd be branded as the biggest satan of all times if you took civs last city.

Now you have capitol, best civs city and Arabia is flagged as bad guy.

I guess so.

A similar situation I had in a current civ4 game, where Qin lost his capital to the barbs.
After the bombardment I was one unit short to capture Beijing, IBT Qin took his city back.
He must have had some units at the other side of the city where I did not have sight.

Socratatus said:

York, her last and only city, was on the sea coast. I took my time and surrounded it on land with archers, 2 catapults, spearmen and a swordsman unit, then calmly pelted her city to 0 defences...

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If York's defenses were at 0, then why wouldn't you just take the city yourself?

Nares said:

If York's defenses were at 0, then why wouldn't you just take the city yourself?

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Figure it out.

Kriogen's right, you never want to eradicate a civ. You probably incurred a "major" warmongerer penalty for taking the cap, possibly "extreme," but completing genocide on a civ means the warmongerer slider is cranked to 11 and everyone will hate you, so no research agreements, luxes trade at 3GPT instead of 7 GPT, embargoes, and higher inclinations of being DoWed upon, often en masse.

Also, Nares's point is valid - cities are taken by first using ranged attacks to bring a city down to 0 HP and then sending in a "paper" melee unit to conquer on the same turn, meaning that if, as you said, you brought the city down to 0 HP you should have been able to take it when it was still your turn and before Arabia was allowed to act. So the only thing for him to figure out is that your attack order was incorrect. If you see other civs moving units into range of a target that you want, observe how much power they're adding to the equation and guesstimate how much HP to leave in a city when your turn ends so that when they attack, they can help you out but not quite take the city. This often means skipping a turn with some ranged units.

I was enjoying my destruction of my enemy. I was waiting for the final walk (next turn when my troops were ready) while he was totally naked. I didn`t know Saudi arabia was that sneaky, especially being a friend.

But even then I had the city *encircled by land.* I didn`t expect him to do a rush in by sea. Happy now?

Sea rushes are the most surprising, You can't always rely on the ocean as a barrier.

reddishrecue said:

Sea rushes are the most surprising, You can't always rely on the ocean as a barrier.

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Yea. True. I had no idea he even had troops out there. I have to hand it to AI for it`s sneaky grab, he shadowed me, then `snap!` but if that was real life, it would be an act of war. I will let it go this time. Lesson learned!

covered that

ShakaKhan said:

If you see other civs moving units into range of a target that you want, observe how much power they're adding to the equation and guesstimate how much HP to leave in a city when your turn ends so that when they attack, they can help you out but not quite take the city. This often means skipping a turn with some ranged units.

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also, I don't see how your friend attacking your enemy is sneaky

Socratatus said:

Yea. True. I had no idea he even had troops out there. I have to hand it to AI for it`s sneaky grab, he shadowed me, then `snap!` but if that was real life, it would be an act of war. I will let it go this time. Lesson learned!

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Its kind of ironic in a way since there's the great barrier reef natural wonder that uses ocean tiles unlike the lake victoria which is also water but uses land tiles instead.

On the bright side, there will be times when an AI does the work and you take the city.

Did Arabia (not sure where you got the Saudi part from...) DoW the same turn he took the city? If so, you got unlucky in a way but if not, you should have seen it coming. He's an ally against a common enemy, what did you expect? In any case, him taking the city was a huge diplomatic boon for you as wiping a civ off the map comes with a ridiculous warmonger penalty.

Under the circumstances, you only lost around 150ish gold in plunder. I generally sell extra cities I capture because it's easier to deal with happiness

GenuineRisk said:

Did Arabia (not sure where you got the Saudi part from...) DoW the same turn he took the city? If so, you got unlucky in a way but if not, you should have seen it coming. He's an ally against a common enemy, what did you expect? In any case, him taking the city was a huge diplomatic boon for you as wiping a civ off the map comes with a ridiculous warmonger penalty.

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I think I need to make something clear to a lot of you people out there:

I don`t play Civ like a calculator. This means I don`t play the game worrying about taking a hit for destroying every last city of a Civ. I knew that completely wasting England would make everyone not like me much. But England attacked me at a time I needed to grow and stunted my development, so I turn around and wipe her out.

I like to play the way I want to play. I don`t go `oh noes. I didn`t get 10.5% of gold for a 7.65% iron trade!` Or, `How much of a % of a % does angkor wat give me on a marshy ground with dancing clowns on it when divided by 6.7637733!`.

I know i`d get the hit- I don`t care.

And Saudi obviously didn`t care either.

I had no idea dancing clowns add +1 production on marsh tiles with Angkor Wat

Thats a mod?

I would declare war because saudi arabia denied me the satisfaction of seeing Queen Elizabeth's defeat screen especially if she has been a jerk to me for the whole game.

And plus I would want the warmonger hate because I want the AIs to be more prepared for me so I can have more exciting battles. suckerpunching a AI is no fun at all.