CS defeating major civ

[Tigranes]

Have you ever seen it? Today I witnessed something extraordinary -- Norway attacked Armagh (not even military CS) and got it's butt kicked very hard. Not only they lost all the attacking units and had to retreat, but also those Irishmen did not stop there, they went ahead and razed nearby Norwegian city.

 

[Morningcalm]

I saw it in Civ V, but not Civ VI--at one point the CS in Civ V took over a city and had two cities.

 

[jasper]

Lucky.

Ive gone out of my way to set this scenerio up. I Killed all enemy civ units and sieged the city to zero hps and the nearby city state withdrew instead of attacked. The city state and enemy city were touching borders in my last attempt and city state units were within the enemy civ borders at the time.

Ive probably done this 3 or so times in different games. I thought they were coded to defend but no attack.

 

[sonicmyst]

It happened to my game yesterday. Spain and Macedon did a joint war against me (Cree) while I am in dark age and my nearby suz'ed CS came to help me defend and they attacked a nearby Spanish city as well using only crossbowmen. I captured the city using only one heavy chariot. Lol.

 

[AlanC9]

I've seen CSs capture cities -- or rather, raze them -- but never without a major city ally.

 

[Lily_Lancer]

It is normal when Hungary upgrades and returns the advanced unit to CSs. Given Machine Guns and Infantries for CS and AI only have musketmen or crossbows, they're sure to be victorious.

 

[Futumch]

I've been curious about this too. I often found myself in a position where a City State I was suzerain of was being picked on by one of the other AIs. So one time, I used the firetuner editor and gave the city state walls and a couple of Modern Armour. They ended up razing two of the AI cities in fairly short order.
Obviously this was massive overkill but I wanted to see what would happen if you gave the CS a pretty hefty hammer to use. I like tinkering around with those "what if.." ideas, it gives the game longevity even if you toss the save file a few weeks later.

I often think that with each new era the City States ought to get the next level of walls for nothing.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

I've seen a couple games where a civ declares war on a city-state but the city-state gets the upper hand. The most memorable was Gorgo. She attacked Brussels and was repulsed. But she was incapable of seeking peace, because Gorgo, right? Brussels ate her army, then slowly razed all her cities. City-states can't take capitals, so it ended with a millennium-long siege with the arrmies of Brussels completely surrounding Sparta 3 tiles deep and the city's health at zero, science ground to a halt, producing units at a glacial pace. It was hilarious and pathetic. I wanted so badly just to put Gorgo out of her misery, but Brussels was my ally and I couldn't get a unit within range of Sparta to capture it due to the carpet of doom surrounding the city.

 

[Pfeffersack]

I saw it in Civ V, but not Civ VI--at one point the CS in Civ V took over a city and had two cities.

Yes, happened in a few of my games as well. Actually a twist I like. I always wondered (but never never tested out) if a CS in Civ5 could become even bigger, when no city city-razing is activated in the setup.

 

[Vandlys]

Have you ever seen it? Today I witness something extraordinary -- Norway attacked Armagh (not even military CS) and got it's butt kicked very hard. Not only they lost all the attacking units and had to retreat, but also those Irishmen did not stop there, they went ahead and razed nearby Norwegian city.

Was this also a large city? Was this Norway's final city? If not, should I now consider having defeated a Civ if I take one city? Your title is a bit misleading : P

 

[Deadly Dog]

Definitely seen this.

Earlier this year had a game where I went to war on Germany to liberate a CS ally. Was an island with 3 CS total and a German city from overseas. I levied the untis of one city state and proceeded to liberate my ally. But meanwhile the other CS still on the island, also my ally, attacked and razed the German colony.

Also saw Germany (different game) have all their cities except the capital razed by Barbarians over several dozen turns. The decline began after they took a CS that I was Suzerain of and while my war of liberation wasn't that hard (the CS was close to them but over slow terrain), it did let me get close enough to see they had serious barbarian problems. Later I sent a wave of combat units, settlers and archaeologists over to claim their lost provinces. And, yes, once I was ready, Aachen as well.

So I may be less impressed with AI Barbarossa than some of you, subjectively speaking.

Also have seen a CS capture and keep another CS but that was in vanilla, pre-loyalty, and never seen it since. More often and more recently have seen CS raze another CS but again not since 2 patches ago or more.

 

[Hans Castorp]

Yes, a few times, though usually outlying cities near the CS. Never seen anything quite so dramatic as the situation described by Eagle Pursuit.

 

[Timothy001]

I've seen a couple games where a civ declares war on a city-state but the city-state gets the upper hand. The most memorable was Gorgo. She attacked Brussels and was repulsed. But she was incapable of seeking peace, because Gorgo, right? Brussels ate her army, then slowly razed all her cities. City-states can't take capitals, so it ended with a millennium-long siege with the arrmies of Brussels completely surrounding Sparta 3 tiles deep and the city's health at zero, science ground to a halt, producing units at a glacial pace. It was hilarious and pathetic. I wanted so badly just to put Gorgo out of her misery, but Brussels was my ally and I couldn't get a unit within range of Sparta to capture it due to the carpet of doom surrounding the city.

Maybe you could have bought their army and killed her? Or was it too much money.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

Maybe you could have bought their army and killed her? Or was it too much money.

Yeah, I guess I could have leased the city-state army. This was back during vanilla and it wasn't something I utilized much then.

 

[Tigranes]

It happened to my game yesterday. Spain and Macedon did a joint war against me (Cree) while I am in dark age and my nearby suz'ed CS came to help me defend and they attacked a nearby Spanish city as well using only crossbowmen. I captured the city using only one heavy chariot. Lol.

By the way, after 448 hours playing this I never once managed to get a dark age. I even stoped much of the activity, just out of curiosity, you know, just to try those dark age policies -- but no luck. Somehow I always manage to accumulate enough points.

Was this also a large city? Was this Norway's final city? If not, should I now consider having defeated a Civ if I take one city? Your title is a bit misleading : P

No, it was a very young size two city, no walls, Norway had many more cities, but came with 3 horseman (probably sing the horses I sold them) and one cat. Armagh had crossbows and couple of swordsmen and walls. All naturally, I never used their military, never upgraded and returned. They did it all on their own, and now I can see that I got lucky, judging from the comments.

 

[Leucarum]

I saw it on the switch version - or at least close - but I think there are some concesssions to processing power in terms of how the AI works there. Sparta attacked a city state which could barely move the millitary units it had accumulated due to a lack of space for new ones. Sparta gave it the opportunity to move them and then was no more.