Offensive or Defensive War

In times past, the way I've almost always declared war was to move my troops just outside the soon-to-be enemy's borders, make sure we didn't have any agreements going (I hate trashing my rep), then delcare war and try to move in with as many fast units as I could. The whole goal is to take as many cities as possible in every turn (slow work in AA, a thing of beauty when combining rails and arty in Industrial and Modern). However, it also occurs to me that it might also make sense to declare war, then wait for the AI to invade, pick off his troops inside your border, and only move into his territory once he's depleted his resources. Of course, neither way is always best, but here's my question. What are the guidelines for deciding on a defensive war or an offensive one?

I think that if you are in a dominant position, the first approach is better. But if your military is roughly equal (or you are weaker), the latter approach is better.

I find that my fast units outpace my artillery. Especially in the AA. I will then try to take some major objective, then form a chokepoint or kill zone where my catapults can redline the counterattack while I regroup.

Defensive wars are harder to set up pre-rails because you don't know exactly where the AI will attack. Also, the AI loves to walk across your mountains and hills, pillaging all the way. They can be pretty hard to dislodge on rough terrain. That being said, the AI is fairly easy to bait with an empty city. They pay no attention to the fact that the city is surrounded by your units, just that the city is "defenseless".

AI troops also can't seem to pass up the chance to capture workers. You can easily bait the AI's mobile units, in particular, into spreading out by stationing slave workers at a close enough distance that they can see them, but far enough that they can't move after capturing them. The AI's stack of Knight or Cav Doom will split up, capture some, and then be stranded in the open for you to pick off one at a time.

Then you can recapture the workers and do it again, or beat up their now-weakened SOD with catapults

A good reason to let the AI attack first is to to trigger MPPs, by the way. You can often isolate an AI opponent by signing MPPs with everyone they have an MPP with, then just let them attack you first. This isn't an issue before nationalism of course.

Fatal Exception said:

A good reason to let the AI attack first is to to trigger MPPs, by the way. You can often isolate an AI opponent by signing MPPs with everyone they have an MPP with, then just let them attack you first. This isn't an issue before nationalism of course.

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Heh heh. I love using the AI's MPPs against them. In addition to getting the AI's allies to all side with you against them (and leaving a worker as bait near the border will do the trick quite nicely), you can also use an MPP trigger to effectively ROP rape an opponant without it counting as breaking an agreement or having it count against you.

Say you have China as a hated neighbor. Sign a Right of Passage Agreement with them and move your mighty stacks of slow infantry and artillary right up against their city tiles. Nothing they can do, right? But don't declare war against China. Declare war against someone China has an MPP with (let's say Babylon), then go knocking on Hammurabi's door with a few fast troops. That triggers their MPP with China. China now has to delcare war against you, which is too bad for them, because in that same turn, before they can mount any kind of an attack at all, you're going to pound 4 or 5 or more of his cities into dust with your arty and smack down all his redlined defenders with your infantry, both of whom would be too slow to use in a first strike otherwise. You can end up with half his empire or more in your pocket in just the first turn. It can be the highlight of the whole Industrial Age.