Gifting Cities

[Rambuchan]

I've often read about gifting cities to rival or ally civs and have done so a few times. It's pretty good to get cosy relations with someone quickly. I've never got techs or cash for them, it's always been a gift cos they won't offer anything for it.

I'm wondering about using a gift city to bring two civs into conflict who are otherwise separated by distance. Is it a good idea to gift a city to a strong civ to try and get another to wage war on them for that city? If the city is in a sensitive place do they go to war with each other more often than not or would it be a waste?

What are the ideal kind of situations in which giving a city to a rival is a good idea?

 

[k-a-bob]

Here is what I have done recently:
I am at war, and my opponent lands on an island where I have basically no defense (my oversight - but they aren't realy worth much - very corrupt). I am in Republic, so if I lose a city, I get a WW hit. So before they attack, I gift the city to the weakest civ around - so my opponent does not get the city, and I don't get a WW hit.

 

[IbnSina]

Once I had a rather unsuccessful game in which I owned my entire continent, and an opponent was taking over his continent. Since it had been pretty unsuccessful, I had no appreciable tech lead over my powerful opponent, and hence no real interest in attacking him near the end of the game. I just wanted to get out early with a diplo win. Unfortunately, that required somebody to vote for me in the election. When the only remaining civ that could do so was about to go under, I gifted them one of my unproductive interior cities. That became their capital when they were kicked off the other continent. I then easily fought off all attempts by my powerful opponent to capture my ally's last city...

 

[Rik Meleet]

The above mentioned gifts are the most common - preventing WarWeariness and keeping a Civ alive.

There is another special gift; the gift of the Great Library. Let's assume you build or conquered the Great Library. As its effect ends with Education there is a tactic (or exploit) to gift it to a far away civ just before you get education. Later on in the game you take it back and since it hasn't expired on you you get all techs 2 other civs have. If performed well you get a free ride into the Industrial age or -if you ar brave- into the Modern Age.

I've never used it; the drawback -no research and thus a big tech-gap- is not nice. Defending cities with pikes when Modern Armor is around takes steel nerves.

 

[vmxa]

Here is what I have done recently:
I am at war, and my opponent lands on an island where I have basically no defense (my oversight - but they aren't realy worth much - very corrupt). I am in Republic, so if I lose a city, I get a WW hit. So before they attack, I gift the city to the weakest civ around - so my opponent does not get the city, and I don't get a WW hit.

The idea can also be used to slow down a superior civ on your land mass. If you are playing with a large land mass and several civs surrounding you and you get sneak attacked, you can gift the exposed cities to a weak civ.

You avoid the WW, get your units out of harms way and the strong civ does not get those cities. You have to stop that civ at the next city. Just hold on till they talk peace.

Now you can go to war with the civ you gave those cities to and get them back. They were far away and do not have much to defend those cities, maybe rushed one unit or two.

If the strong civ captures them, you do not get them back for a long time and in fact may get eliminated. Those few units you retrieved could be the difference in stopping the invasion.

This is not going to happen in games below Demi, but is not unheard of at demi and deity. It gets shaky at sid as you probably will not stop the invader before the other civ reenforces those cities.

 

[Gyathaar]

There is another tactic/exploit that involves gifting away cities.. when you gift away a city, all units inside the city is teleported to the capital.
This can be used to trasport huge amounts of units between different continents without having to use boats.

 

[antonio]

I hav only given am city once it was so they would like me more soi could trade 4 a technolagy i wanted.I gave them one of my distant colanies it had low production and high corupion it was not worth much.I once managed to successfully trade 2 of my citys for 2 of my rivals but i placed troops next the ones i gave him and next to the ones i got so i amanaged to agin 2 citys 4 no loss of life and then went on to destroy him

 

[Rwedgie]

If I'm fighting a large AI and I have enough cities as it is, sometimes instead of razing cities i'll gift them to weaker civs just so that the land can't be reclaimed by one of the more powerful civs.

I always find later in the game that third or fourth most powerful AI's got settlers apparently just sitting around and as soon as you raze an enemy city they'll try to settle that land ASAP. That annoys me to no end, so I give the city to the weakest civ. It's usually so corrupt they can't do anything with it anyways.

 

[vmxa]

yes they often have settlers sitting around. This is a smart thing to do for a civ that is at war, use them as combat settlers. Too bad that is not what the AI is doing with them.