The Question - Open Borders

[Bolgard]

Here's something I've been curious about after a few experiences (brutal ones). Early on, every civ, of course, asks me for open borders. My knee-jerk reaction is to tell them to sod off, because years of Civ III have left me frustrated and angry at the total disrespect the AI has shown me over the years for my state's borders.

Unfortunately, telling them to sod off usually doesn't elevate me to sainthood in their eyes, and early in the game, strikes against me seem to make me a candidate for an invasion.


Admittedly, the game just came out, so a lot of these theories about how the AI operates are still up in the air.

How do you guys handle the open borders issue? Is conceding on open borders with one civ and handling the inconvenience that comes with it a good strategy just to gain an ally?

 

[Xeos]

I usually don't find it very inconvenient to have open borders. It also helps to keep them from attacking me too soon. If they do decide to declare war, all their units will warp out of your borders. The only real reasons I can see for not having open borders is to prevent them from moving across a chokepoint, or stopping missionaries.

 

[Ephor]

Having open boarders, and especially having them early and keeping them going, is a great way to get an easy + modifier to your diplomatic relations with that civ. Make friends where you can, because you're bound to find enemies.

 

[yendorII]

Ive found that it sort of depends on your situation. If your way ahead of the other civs I see no reason to let them in. But if you are behind as I have been on Noble, (man that AI is tough) I have found that is a good way to prevent wars and give yourself a shot at getting a key tech or something.

 

[Ashmantious]

Another reason to have open borders, you can't trade resources without them.

 

[Shillen]

Here's an awesome experience I had last night with open borders. It was early in the game and I only had two cities. The barbarians founded a new city right where I was going to place my next city. I send my spare archer up there to take out the city, but find 3 warriors in the city and my archer drops to 1/3 health on the first attack. So I need support. I take the archer out of my capital since my capital is on the coast and blocked in by my other city. Well that sends my capital into unhappiness, but oh well I really need to take this barb city. Sure enough, as soon as my archer is 3-4 turns away from the capital the AI sends an Indian warrior into my territory straight at my capital. This is on prince difficulty, so I'm like oh crap they're going to take my city just like they do in civ3. Nope, the exploring Indian warrior actually fortifies himself inside my capital, which not only gives it a defender but removes the unhappiness! I couldn't believe it.

 

[Wembley]

Wow Shillen thats crazy. However I have yet to open my borders to any civ, of course i'm still playing on chieftain. It seems to me that i've got more to hide than they have for me to see and usually they won't trade me for anything i need anyway.

 

[adv_dp_fan]

In my first game I kept my borders closed the whole time yet the Russians kept trading resources with me. They'd offer and I'd accept. But they'd ask for open borders and I'd refuse.

 

[gravix]

When I play the Continents map, if I get a corner to myself I will try to build a territory wall to choke the AI and grab as much of their land as possible. I tend to leave my "corner" undeveloped while I'm choking the AI, so if I opened my borders they would probably walk right in and settle in this area. Keeping the borders closed completely prevents them from getting to this area, which is awesome. This strategy works a lot better in Civ IV than it did in Civ III.

Once I've got all the land settled, I open borders and start converting neigboring Civs to my state religion. I play a mostly peaceful game, so this is my "war".

 

[QiZhe]

Well, the AI is no longer in a citybuilding craze like in Civ3 where they just had to get their hands on every single unsettled tile on the map. In Civ4, if the location isn't good (I believe they settle on those blue circles you'd get if you had a settler), they won't settle there. Thus, if you had a corner that was desert, they're not going to want to settle there.

 

[Rameau's Nephew]

I messed up in my current game by refusing to open borders early enough. I (India) was sharing a small continent with Egypt. I had her penned in fairly well, and I didn't want her sneaking around me to claim the iron that she lacked. So I refused to sign. Unfortunately, she made contact with the Greeks, on a nearby large island. They succeeded in converting her to bhuddism (in a rare bit of historical accuracy, my India had founded Hinduism), and it took quite a bit of maneuvering to prevent the two of them from acting in concert against me. By the time I realized my mistake and opened the border, she was a Theocracy, so my missionaries got nowhere.

I was kicking myself for a while because I could have easily converted all of her major cities before she caught the Bhuddist bug.

 

[Vertronix]

No open borders for me....at least not in the 3 full games I've played so far. I use territorial boundaries to ensure myself the time to fully develop my "core cities" (usually 3-7 cities).

Once I have my core fully functional and my preferred Civics in place, I begin the process of assimilating my neighbors. I prefer to overwhelm them with superior culture and demand for my religion, but if that isn't working or is taking too long, it's time for a force of arms invasion instead.

 

[fastspawn]

I have come to the realization that a civilization player who has played in earlier series might feel uncomfortable letting AI explore their territory. This is because in Civ III and Civ II and Civ I, opponents can land right next to your inner city and declare war, or start pillaging away at ur soft inner core. But now i noticed any declaration of war expels enemy units away from the borders so there shouldn't be this problem.

It is a paradigm shift that we have to adjust to.

(of course open borders means they can explore your territory)

 

[Ruffin]

Once I've got all the land settled, I open borders and start converting neigboring Civs to my state religion. I play a mostly peaceful game, so this is my "war".

At about that point myself. Last game was open borders for everyone... they still tried to kill me. This game I sealed off the territory I wanted, filled in behind it, and now it's time to open the borders and assimilate the gentiles. Of course, I'm still killing my neighbors militarily, too.

 

[warpstorm]

I open them with nearly anyone I don't plan on attacking in the immediate future. The good faith and extra money is worth it.

 

[Shillen]

You want to open them even if it's just for the positive attitude adjustment you get. Unlike Civ3, if the other civs don't like you then they won't trade techs or anything to you either. They're also much more likely to declare war. It helps a ton to be on the AI's good side in Civ4.

 

[GreenMonkey]

I've played around with 2-3 games now. I killed both games as my warring was going ineffectively.

If you do Open Borders with everyone early, everyone seems to like you and continue liking you. I would never get attacked.

If you keep closed borders (like my current game) you can strategically spread out cities to create a border and keep your enemies from building cities behind it. Then you can expand backward and fill it as you wish. But it makes everyone not really like you.

 

[Vertronix]

If you keep closed borders (like my current game) you can strategically spread out cities to create a border and keep your enemies from building cities behind it. Then you can expand backward and fill it as you wish. But it makes everyone not really like you.

I've never been a fan of the Civ3 "exploit"....attempting to whore the same technologies all over the world...milking the system to get ahead. I prefer to carve out my territory and then make it the BEST....culturally...and militarily.

I don't care if the AIs like me or not....I'm only going to assimilate them in the end anyway. The only question is will it be now? (Should they choose to bring the fight to me immediately) Or will it be later? (Should they choose to leave me in peace to fully develop my cultural core).

 

[SilentMage]

Open Borders is something you should definately do and I highly recommend you offer them to your nearest neighbor if you wish to avoid an early conflict.

Take my current game situation:

I, the Americans, started on a continent, which was shared with the Mongolians to my left, the Romans to my right, and the Persians directly south. I founded Hinduism and quickly converted my entire nation of 4 cities (at the time) to the religion. Luckily for me, both Mongolia, Rome, AND Persia didn't found any religions (Persia eventually founded Christianity and Rome Islam, but it was too late by then -- you'll see why), so I quickly offered Open Borders to get my missionaries in both nations. Of course, this made settling unconquered land more competitive in the long run, but not so much so that any of us would kill each other over it.

By 1000AD almost all of Mongolia, Persia, and Rome were Hindu. They all made Hinduism their state religions, bringing the entire continent in an era of peace that has yet to be shattered. Despite the unit buildups on the Roman and Mongolian sides, and the apparent hatred that Mongolia naturally has for Persia, all 4 of us remained in a state of peace. I suppose the only "wars" we had were cultural in nature, as we all fought to gain as much cultural supremacy as possible.

It is now 1530AD, and with the discovery of the English, Arabs, and Japanese, I have made it a point to attempt to convert them too, but so far I have only successfully converted the English to Hinduism (this wouldn't have been possible w/o Open Borders with the English, of course).

However, I have a feeling that a war will break out b/w everyone on my continent and the Japanese, since they really don't like any of us AT ALL.

The moral of the story is: Open Borders is very good, especially if you want to unite nations under a religious banner, which is quite strong and will last a very long time.

 

[TreeFoot]

OPen broders are fine, unlike Civ3 they can't get in your way to stop you from moving everywhere (headache in civ3 where i lost my cross country railroad system because of the AI stopping in the middle of the tracks), and because unlike civ3, missionaries can be sent out.