City count question and tips to keep up with AI tech/policy wise as chill warmonger

[Edusd]

Hello everyone, im new to VP and I have some questions regarding owned cities and technology/policy.

If we are playing warmonger are we supposed to puppet conquered cities or anex them? If we conquer/found them, wouldn't we have issues down the line keeping up with the AI on tech and policies?

I'm worried that if I annex/found too many cities the tech/policy cost raises to a point where I can't keep up with the AI (tech/policy wise), any comments about this?

I've read some threads where people mention having 19+ cities, idk if owned or puppeted, but can you ever stay on par with the Ai (on tech/policy) with that many cities?


Context for this topic (skippable I guess, but is for illustrating with my current game):

So I have been playing the incas (prince, epic speed, 16 civs large random map that ended up being 2 continents) in a "chill warmonger way".

In the early/mid game I pulled ahead with some warmongering, went authority and did some wars, did some razing and some vassalizing affecting 3-4 neighbor civs and taking 2 capitals (ended up with 1 vassal and 3 angry civs), pushing my score ahead and having a good position technology wise. I did most of this before advancing from medieval Era. At this point I was the #2 civ with 8 owned cities (no puppets) only behind Russia (4 cities) who was barely ahead score wise (about even tech but had 3-4 more policies than me)

After that I went chill (main mistake I guess, but I didn't want to rush wars) and tried to keep good public relations with the world while building my cities up (locked most pop but went heavy on buildings) , but now in the industrial era I find myself in a pinch. Everyone hates me (I thought early warfare wasn't that bad for relations, guess I was wrong), they sanctioned me, and I'm behind about 4 techs from most civs, and 3-4 policies behind.

How can I catch up at this point? Most civs hates me, I have a big warmonger bonus (so AI has anti warmonger boost) , my gold is hurting real bad because of the sanction (I have 7/8 cities on gold production to keep +60 or so gpt) and every spy I send to tech steal gets killed. What to do? How can I catch up on tech and policies? Do I just reroll the game?

Policy wise I went authority (1 from finisher) and then some fealty because I got a religion, got the artsy opener for GP generation and went imperialism with rationalism free tech. I guess doing so much mixing ended up costing me as well but is not like the policies I took don't help me either. My capital is my main culture and GP hub, getting some policies thx to GP pop but its not enough. Other cities went to gold generation to not go bankrupt but most of them have all the culture and science buildings up.

I can barely war anymore because AI has more advanced military with antiwar monger bonus, making my military pale in comparison. Any tips/advice?

 

[stii]

I'd generally try and take as few AI cities as possible and just try and make them your vassals. This both reduces the warmonger penalty and makes people hate you less. I'd generally annex capitals and puppet everything else. 19 cities is an awful lot and I don't think you gain any real benefit from having quite that many. Even if I conquer everyone on a six player map I'd never have 19 cities.

 

[Edusd]

I'd generally try and take as few AI cities as possible and just try and make them your vassals. This both reduces the warmonger penalty and makes people hate you less. I'd generally annex capitals and puppet everything else. 19 cities is an awful lot and I don't think you gain any real benefit from having quite that many. Even if I conquer everyone on a six player map I'd never have 19 cities.

Yes that makes sense. Currently (and as an update) I have been able to turn it around and catch up to most AIs tech/policy wise by focusing more on tech and culture specialist+ GPS pops and inner trades with my vassals. After a while I was able to repel the trade sanction I had and that definitely helped boost my progress as well.

Next campaign I would focus more on getting vassals and puppeting as you said, it might make things less difficult.

What I do have an issue right now is with anti warmonger fever, England has some of that against me and it's crazy how long it takes to capture a puppet city of them considering I have a stronger army and I'm attacking with siege units and all that. I will have to look into this to see how I can play around this fever because it's really strong.

Thanks for the feedback.

 

[stii]

There are two basic option for dealing with anti warmonger fervour, along with the take less cities more vassals I've mentioned already

Reduce the penalty, it is far less if the AI declares war on you so if they do it is often worth it to refuse to peace out and in the long run take their cities. There is also the casus belli resolution which provides a pretty huge reduction again. If lots of the AI liek it this will often be the first thing I propose.

Stack combat buffs so you have +75 or more on your units. Everyone can get 10- authority 10- heroic epic 15- autocracy 25- autocracy 15 great general. And there are others like defender of the faith you can sometimes get

 

[Edusd]

There are two basic option for dealing with anti warmonger fervour, along with the take less cities more vassals I've mentioned already

Reduce the penalty, it is far less if the AI declares war on you so if they do it is often worth it to refuse to peace out and in the long run take their cities. There is also the casus belli resolution which provides a pretty huge reduction again. If lots of the AI liek it this will often be the first thing I propose.

Stack combat buffs so you have +75 or more on your units. Everyone can get 10- authority 10- heroic epic 15- autocracy 25- autocracy 15 great general. And there are others like defender of the faith you can sometimes get

We finally approved casus belli in my campaign and wow it makes a big difference warmonger wise.

Thanks for the tips, I will keep them in mind next time