how important to consolidate?

[podraza]

I am experiencing a major problem playing on Standard sized maps. I want to attack and destroy nearby Civs with early Ax rushes. On Prince, this usually means the victim has 2 or 3 cities by the time I reach him with an army of 6. (that sound about right to everybody?)

Anyway, on standard map, after I've taken the enemy's 2 or 3 cities, I find myself with something of a far flung empire. Even after popping each city's fat x, they won't consolidate into one territory. I'd have to send some settlers in to occupy the space between.

I hate that. I like to tack my cities on to each other such that they are always consolidated (or will be so soon). However, I'm not sure if I hate it because it actually is bad play, or if I hate due to some anal retentive tendencies on my part, tendencies I need to learn to get over. If having a seperated empire is part of any advanced game strategy, I clearly need to get over it.

Comments as to that?

And related to this, I'm wondering how to play the Obelisk. I developed an addiction to the Creative trait and I am trying to break it, if only to branch out a little. I am interested in learning how to play effectively with Saladin, inspired by some succession games I've followed. Anyway, the Obelisk. If the Obelisk didn't go obsolete, I would think it a no brainer to build it in every city. But because it goes obsolete, and because it comes at a time in the game when I would very much like to be building other things (units, granaries, barracks, etc), I am very tempted to ignore it if and when possible.

So when is that? Well, if it is not terribly important to have consolidated borders (see above), then I would be happy to wait until library or temple or religion spreads to pop the fat X. It seems like the obelisk should only be built if I need access to a resource tile. If I don't, I have enough tiles to grow into until library.

What do you think of that?

 

[automator]

Depends on how big a stretch it is between your settlements and the cities you're destroying. Also, if there the area between is worth settling.

I had a similar situation in my current game. Mansa placed two cities next to me that threatened my iron supply (if a culture battle was won by his city, I would lose my iron). His other cities were far off (later fit three large cities between my original borders and his nearest city). But I went ahead and destroyed him. The unfortunate consequence was that I now have a very wide but thin empire. So nearly every city is a "border" city, and until I get rails, it takes 8 turns to bring troops from the east to the west.

It was definitely worth it. I just entered the Industrial era, I'm at tech parity with my point neighbors, I'm at the top in points, and I'm poised to conquer the other continents (which is behind my continent in tech). This is the first time I've ever done so well on Prince; my previous prince wins were predicated on and overwhelming settlement effort in the new world in a terra game (for a domination win), and a permanent alliance with a tech leader (I was a backwards country).