Razing Cities

[Loki130]

I don't do it, but that's just me. What about you? Is it worth it, is it worth it not to, whatever. Sorry if there's already been something like this, I'm not going to sift through 615 pages of threads.

 

[schizerbone]

I mostly don't raze cities, but I do when I have to (when I can't defend that city...or if I don't think I'll have enough culture to keep it for long)

 

[CarthageFTW]

I never raze cities that can be absorbed into my empire. the only cities I raze are typically capitals out of sheer fun(and as an unltimate sign of disrespect, I rename on of my cities after it) and cities I have no hope of keeping or that have no strategic value. If i'm at war with my neighboor for example, I don't raze. But if it's a cross country war, I might raze a few.

 

[darski]

I don't do it often because it costs you in rep/attitude points. I have been known to raze a city as revenge when the citizens have been a major pain or tossed my best cav units for some two-bit dictator. (I, being a 4 bit dictator, feel that I have higher standards)

 

[Sashie VII]

I almost always do. I like collecting slaves

That, and I often play some city-limit variant nowadays (OCC, 3CC, 5CC, 7CC etc)

 

[Turner]

Like Most Things Civ, it depends. If the AI is off on city placement (99% of the time) and it would be convenient for me to start a new city (maybe half the time) I'll raze it.

 

[capnvonbaron]

Never, unless it is an auto-raze of a zero-culture city. I prefer "tactical abandonment" after a few turns of military garrison if the natives don't fall in line.

 

[Thorvald of Lym]

If it's one of those Arctic outposts or cramped metropolitan suburbs.

 

[Exwing17]

It totally depends on the “character” of my civilisation, the location of the city, chance of holding it, placement, defensive forces available…blah blah

If I’m playing a nice empire, like the Republic of the English Commonwealth (my recent spacerace win) I will keep cities, and try to trade them with the computer if I don’t want them! Although this seldom works. My game before was the Fascist Reich of the Mayan Dominion…and they razed cities. Sometimes just for the fun of it.

 

[Taras Bulba]

I like to keep it, to save me the time of trying to rebuild a city

 

[ronanp]

I don't do it often because it costs you in rep/attitude points. I have been known to raze a city as revenge when the citizens have been a major pain or tossed my best cav units for some two-bit dictator. (I, being a 4 bit dictator, feel that I have higher standards)

Yeah I have been known to do it out of spite. Most recently the Aztec's just wouldn't talk peace with me. I had one well defended city on their continent. Was picking off all their units they where throwing at me to the extent that I had a city full of elite modern armor, and bombed their resources to bits. But they just wouldn't talk peace. In my anonyence I took and razed two of their cities and set about scorching their entire empire with my bombers.

I am not sure if it got them to the peace talks quicker but I felt better afterwards and need to get my war wearness in check so I could finish off the Koreans on the other continent to push me over the domination limit

 

[del62]

Certainly up to monarch level there is no reason ever to raise a city, beyond that some say you need to, when i move up to that level guess ill find out.

 

[Padma]

"It depends."

I normally don't, unless the placement is all wrong, and I feel it would be worth the time and effort to 're-position' it. I almost never raze for revenge.

But, a few months back, I was trying to beat Tokugawa into submission, and his cities would either flip back, or he would re-take them, so, finally, I formed a massive field army, and "with a monarch's voice cried 'Havoc,' and let slip the dogs of war".

I wasn't satisfied until there was nothing but a vast wasteland where the Japanese Empire had once stood....

 

[Globex]

I voted for the first option. I know that it would probably be more cost efficient not to burn enemy cities but I LOVE razing cities. The only thing I like more than razing cities is bombing and bombarding cities and units with tons of artillery and bombers. I don't like micromanaging captured cities and I find having to quell resistors annoying.

I do play games where I don't raze cities but I find those games are less fun than the games where I raze and burn everything in my army's path.

 

[darski]

i have a question on this theme. In my current French game, I had an MA with Liz against Gandhi (he declared) He was second in cities, power and culture so I am guessing that his cities had been around for a good bit. He had 25 cities for a goodly amount of time if I remember correctly.

Anyhoo, in this game, the English seemed to raze a lot of the cities (at least 3) they took. I wasn't paying close attention to the city sizes as I had my hands full with the cities I was taking.

Is this not unusual for the AI? Given the attitude hit for this, it rather surprised me.

 

[Othniel]

Is this not unusual for the AI? Given the attitude hit for this, it rather surprised me.

That does sound unusual. I rarely see the AI raze cities unless it is an autoraze.

I'm curious what factors cause an AI to raze vs. keep the city. Of course, it is probably some complicated algorithm that we will never know.

 

[darski]

I recovered an earlier save so that I can check on those cities. They may have been culture poor. Will get back to you on that one.

 

[Rodrig0]

I've seen the AI raze lots of cities on monarch. Some times I take the territory they left vacant, they may have resources, or just an excelent spot for building. So I let them do the war, raze each other, and then go claim their hardly earned territory. That's one of the reasons I don't raze. I hate when another civ seems to be desperately looking for space, and has settlers in reserve, so when they find there's open ground, they just move there and take it. Some times I'm too busy at war to remember to transport settlers, or maybe I'm waiting for the dust to settle before returning to peaceful building. And then before I can take it, a new city appears. Especially if it is in MY continent This inevitably leads to more war.
I rarely raze cities for placement. If there's a lot of unused space, i just build another city to take it.
And I never raze a city just for revenge. I don't like conquest victory, makes Civ3 seem like a RTS. I play for Domination, that fits my style better. So I try to conquer territory, you don't gain that by razing. Though I have no remorse reliving Sarajevo, taking up a mountain with a few infantries and 50+ artilleries, and auto-bombing those huge, populated, happy and productive cities down to the last citizen, every turn takes about 2 minutes to finish the bombarding, and I watch and actually enjoy, how every improvement is destroyed, civilians killed, soldiers injuried, till there's nothing left to destroy, the city is left a smoking ruin, their only citizen is unhappy, their defenders agonizing then my cavalries just walk in and finish their hopeless defenders in one hit. Then I take the city, watch the aerial view, think of the "now" and the "before", think "was all this necesary?" To hell with regrets! It's war!!
Well, that was long!! I feel better now. Now, if you excuse me, my hands are itching, I have some civ3 to play and some cities to... uh... leave as they are! Yeah, that...

I love this game!!

 

[drakonius]

I personally avoid razing cities since i love adding new peoples to my empire-however if i am particularly wroth with an enemy that i do not like anyway i can be rather brutal.But as a rule I am rather merciful-though I am known to level entire civilizations if it suits me.I am not named Drakonius for nothing.

 

[TheOverseer714]

I'll bet you are a big fan of David Drake, Harry Turtledove and especially S.M. Stirling's Draka series. If you aren't reading those guys, you should be!