King level, what am I doing wrong?

[bdw]

I got pretty good at cultural victories on Prince level, but King is just killing me. I'm hoping for some suggestions to get me out of this.

First off: Civ 5, G&K. I usually play Napoleon for the culture bonus. Only other thing I do is change the # of other civs down to 4 (this seemed to be a good strategy for learning a new difficulty level in Civ 4, maybe it's a problem in Civ 5?)

Anyway, I always seem to reach the same stalemate right around the Pikeman/Musketeer range: I'm going along fine, with between 4 & 6 cities, working on culture, keeping up my military just enough so that I'm not a sitting duck for other civs. I'm playing nice with the other civs, trading, even sometimes giving them gifts to try to butter them up. I'm friends with the one or two who are around me. I'm being very careful not to settle too close to them or do anything to piss them off.

Then BANG! One of my friendly civs declares war on me, usually right around when they get pikemen. We go into a long, drawn-out war because we're pretty well matched. They attack a city, I fight them off, they retreat. Depending on the Civ, they may or may not offer a peace agreement, most often not. But inevitably they come back and attack again, after regrouping and maybe finding one or two more units.

So I'm stuck putting a ton of resources into military, just to keep from being taken over, and my cultural stuff goes by the wayside. Meanwhile, some other civ across the ocean is kicking both me and the attacking civ's butt because they're not stuck in some long drawn-out war.

This has happened about 5 or 6 times now, I keep trying different strategies (attacking them first/trying to be nicer/trying to get ahead of them militarily/just restarting the game when Caesar or another really warlike civ shows up next to me) and nothing I do seems to help. It's beginning to be just not fun for me - what am I doing wrong?

 

[Nurgle84]

A few questions first:

- What is the reason for the attacking civ to wage war? Did you settle to close? Did you build the wrong wonder? Did you buy the wrong CS? Told them to deal with it, when they asked to stop doing things? Or are they just warmongers like Monty etc.?
- How many units did you have? (roughly) How many cities?
- Did you build buildings like City Walls and positioned archers as Garrisons?

Generally if you get DOWed there is always a reason behind it. (Maybe except Monty who declares for lols and culture)

 

[bdw]

A few questions first:

- What is the reason for the attacking civ to wage war? Did you settle to close? Did you build the wrong wonder? Did you buy the wrong CS? Told them to deal with it, when they asked to stop doing things? Or are they just warmongers like Monty etc.?

I don't settle too close, and if they ask me to stop doing things, I agree. I'm not sure how to tell if I built the wrong wonder or bought the wrong CS - how do you know?

I've gotten to the point that if Monty is close, I just start a new game. He's not worth it.

- How many units did you have? (roughly) How many cities?

4-6 cities, and I've taken to building up armies around cities on the border between me and whoever is next to me. So maybe 3-4 units around any of those, and a few units positioned where I can move the quickly to wherever a war might break out.

- Did you build buildings like City Walls and positioned archers as Garrisons?

Definitely around the border towns, not so much with interior towns.

 

[Nurgle84]

Wrong wonder: You get a diplomatic message when hovering the cursor over the name in the diplo screen. Reads like "They covet a wonder you built" or something. I have the german version.

City State: Similar, although you would get a question screen about not getting to friendly with this CS.

Monty: He is not that bad. At least you know what he is up to.

4-6 Cities: Thats the reason. The fifth city is often a trigger for war. You probably also got the "They think we found to many cities" penalty. Civs don´t like runaways.

 

[bdw]

Thanks for the answers!

4-6 Cities: Thats the reason. The fifth city is often a trigger for war. You probably also got the "They think we found to many cities" penalty. Civs don´t like runaways.

So if I want 5 cities, I'd better plan for war? Sheeesh!

OK, I'll try it with 4 cities and see if I have the same issue.

 

[Halcyan2]

Thanks for the answers!

So if I want 5 cities, I'd better plan for war? Sheeesh!

OK, I'll try it with 4 cities and see if I have the same issue.

Civs have issues if you have too many cities. (In contrast, try playing with just 1 city and you will see most AI's are much nicer to you).

A better metric is how many cities you have compared to other civs. Other civs can be pissed off at you when you are at just 3 or 4 cities, if they all only have 1 city themselves.

 

[bdw]

Man, I just can't win!

Just tried with 4 cities. My two neighbor civs were Catherine and Harun el-Rashid.

I was very careful not to settle near them. Of course, they repaid my by both settling RIGHT NEXT to a city of mine.

Played up to about 80 BC, when they both declared war on me at once, coming at me from both the north and the south, and I just gave up.

I've been trying to give away luxury goods and occasionally gold, with the hopes that it'd butter them up, but I can't even tell if it makes a difference. Does it?

 

[Halcyan2]

I would suggest keeping the starting save file and perhaps attaching it so other players can try and see if things are different. (I'm busy the next two weeks but may be able to fit a game in after that).

In fact, that's one of the great things about Game of the Month (GOTM). Everyone is using the same initial save file, so it becomes much more interesting to see how other players' games differ from your experience. You will see whether the same AI's are aggressive (sometimes it is inevitable) or whether other players managed to pacify the AI's, one way or another. I'd suggest trying some of the GOTM's as a learning tool.

 

[droberts97470]

Wrong wonder: You get a diplomatic message when hovering the cursor over the name in the diplo screen. Reads like "They covet a wonder you built" or something.

I don't have anything when I hover over the name in either the relationship or global politics. But everyone is at war with me now. Maybe that's why I don't get a message?

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

Check Demographics to ensure you aren't falling too far behind (don't be last) in Soldiers. And try and fight out the war if it does occur. Ranged units such as Composite Bowmen are great for defense. If you use a bit of tactics you'll pretty much destroy their army and have yourself a productive peace deal.

 

[Xotite potancev]

Some times you just cant be nice. A few games ago started near Nappy DOWed on me three times before i descided there would be no peace and whiped him out. Game just started on a island with greece got oh hi next message die scum even the barbarians think your a looser, things went down hill from there.

Dont give stuff away,sell it, you sell some one that ivory for 240 they will like you almost as much as if you gave it away and can buy a unit to fight them off if they get nasty.

Dont make friends with every one if cathrine and the arabs hate each other and you keep trying to be friends with both you can end up pissing both off.

Halcyan is right on the money try not to have more cities than everyone else. If they all have 3 and you found your 4th be prepared for tantrums that would make a 3year old in the sweet isle at the supermarket look calm. The other civs will pick on a looser but they really hate a winner.

If your going to out city everyone arround you have twice their troops or a big tech advantage before you do.

 

[pubs]

You will always be attacked for something, its part of the game. As I try and create new cities early I tend to put walls up with archers in the cities most likely to be attacked. Positioning of your cities is also important for defence, behind a river and/or on a hill. Leave woods, marsh alone as it slows attackers down and lets you hit them with ranged.

I also try to have a gold reserve so that if I get caught I can buy/upgrade a unit or two or install walls. They will back off once you kill a few units or upgrade and offer good peace terms.

 

[GhostSalsa]

1 Why are you founding so many cities if you are eyeing a culture win?

2 And conversely, why aren't you taking the cities that other Civs generously founded right next to you?

The strongest pathway to a culture win besides OCC is to collect puppets as soon as possible. Puppets are free gold and science that don't inflate culture costs. Even just one puppet can be a huge advantage if it is nabbed in early game and close enough to keep the road cheap.

When your neighbor DOWs you, nab some cities. The reward is that you basically reduced the difficulty level of the game. Or nab all the cities if you are confident you will be able to keep globsl trade relations going afterward.

3 Turning Civ count down probably is causing your distant runaways problem. I would keep that turned up so distant Civs are crowded.

 

[Corvus corax]

For a culture win 4-6 cities may be OK on large or huge maps, but in that case tuning down the number of opponents will kill you. There always will be a runaway civ that will DOW and overrun you. Choosing extra civ might be a better choice (also more trading partners).
Most viable strategy, at least for me, is:
• Found 2-3 cities max yourself, depending on starting position and availability of luxuries and resources.
• Build a regular army and conquer some puppets (for money and science!) early in the game. Keep your army small but up to date all the time.
• Ally cultural (for culture points) and military (for free and up to date units) City States.
• Be careful with declarations of friendship! Check the diplomacy screen regularly and only befriend civs that belong to a steady coalition. This is mainly to assure a few dependable trading partners. (Denouncing their enemies also helps.)
• Plant your spies in the capitols of the civs that most likely will DOW you. Sometimes they will warn you when that civ is preparing for war.
• Use Religion to support Culture! (e.g. with the right beliefs, faith can be used to buy cathedrals (+3 culture), mosques (+2) or pagodas (+2))
Expect to be DOWed a couple of times and always be prepared for a defensive war. Most of the times you can see it coming by checking the diplomatic and demographics screen and the changes in their attitude towards you.

 

[gozpel]

I have a leisure-game going now as the Dutch. On King the AI is somewhat more easy to tick off and that was exactly what happened.

I built 5 cities as quickly as I could, was around turn80 as I needed to build a few units too. But 5 cities at that time is very good, escpecially as each city had one new lux. I saw the map early and I knew I wanted those spots, so I went for it gently, but still fast.

So then, India declares on me together with Egypt on the same turn and Songhai hops in for the fun one turn later. I'm struggling having a wide country and have to defend my best spots. India takes on of my cities with war-elephants and an almost dead warrior, I targetted him, but with 2 hp's or something he takes my city.

30 turns later India is dead, Egypt paid a nice deal for peace, while Songhai just paid a small sum.

Now I have 4 upgraded archers and 4 swords next to Egypt. I "could" continue to play my peacegame, but for some reason the AI distorted my reasoning. This continent is MINE, and after Egypt is gone, Askia will begone and then silly Japan.

This story only tells you one thing, don't trust anybody, kill them all instead. Change your vic to space with 18 blooming cities.

 

[Putmalk]

Your problem is trusting the AI, just fight off their attacks, then charge their cities. Make sure you have two catapults and a few spears. Burn/puppet their cities and make them pay for attacking you. When they're out of the game (by having one city left or completely killed off) you have nothing to worry about and you can continue to build up your culture.

And getting owned on King is usually a sign of a slow starting strategy.