Nuclear Stockpiling

[ongwin]

By building and storing lots of nuclear missiles, does it scare the AI civs as though you have a big army? i.e. You are less likey to get bullied.

I mean just as in real life, how countries build nuclear weapons but do not use them. They just build a large stockpile to scare others. So does the same work in Civ 4 to scare the AI?

 

[coconuts]

My understanding is that the AI reacts to your power rating and to your overall score. I'm not sure how the power rating is calculated but nuclear weapons are surely included, so having a lot probably will make the AI less likely to attack you. However, ICBMs are rather expensive hammerwise, so you might be better off building just normal troops for more versatility unless you feel like you might need the missiles.