Should I vassalize or conquer?

[hexem3117]

In my current game I'm playing as Julius. I started out with rolling over Hannibal easily. Praets are ridiculous...Mansa Musa is blocked off to the south, and unless he sends settlers through my territory, I have the entire area left of Rome to settle. Can probably get 4 or 5, maybe more decent cities out of there. It's a standard map size, I'm not sure what the script is...maybe big and small. Monarch.

However, now I'm at an impasse. Mansa is *the* tech leader on the planet (one of the 50 turn updates said so at turn 150...this save is from 153 IIRC), whereas I'm 5th and at least 5 techs behind Mansa. I can roll over him pretty easily as my production is very solid, but I'm wondering whether it'd be more prudent to just vassalize him once I get Feudalism, which isn't too far off. He'd be a competent tech pal and could feed me good stuff throughout the game.

On the other hand, I'm not sure whether he could keep his teching up late game, as he doesn't have much land, and not too much of it is cottaged as of yet. This makes me wonder if I should destroy him and then cottage up his land and just throw it into my pot of research.

Any suggestions? I've included a save for people to check out. Also, I've included the initial save, because honestly, this is a ridiculous start especially for Rome. Should be an easy win.

I've tried to include screen shots, but I have Vista and I'm not on my administrator account and I can't open my Civ Screenshot folder for some reason...Vista isn't terrible but WHY CAN'T I USE MY OWN FILES AND FIX THINGS WITHOUT HAVING TO LOG ONTO ADMIN?!?!?!?!

 

[quiddity]

didnt took the time to check your saves, but in my opinion all depends on 2 factors.

1. his number of cities ( as u said he's blocked from early eras so i guess 3 4 cities max ? ), a low number of cities implies that if u vassalize him by force the 2 or 3 left ( maybe less ) r not rly significative for him to be an efficient vassal, just stomp him in that case.

2. what's in balance. I mean by this religeous shrines / wonders / needed ressources.
Shrines r rly needed, most if u r playing julius, by stomping civs ur economy may really need it.
Wonders are for ur own decision, useless wonders can be ignored but GG ones like mids / GLH etc .. r like shrines or so.
By ressources i mean the rare ones , if u need copper / horse / iron and ask him for a tribute when u vassalize can be unefficient , vassal without copper / iron r pretty useless ( i assume u already got iron for praets but i talk in general cases ).

to be short, vassalize tiny civs near ur borders is pretty useless in most cases unless if u want avoid a border with an agressive enemy.

my opinion btw

 

[DABegley]

Just kill him. Removes the residual culture issues and prevents the problem of if he can keep his tech rate up he could sneak a space race victory out from under you. If he wasn't the tech leader I would consider vassaling him but once he's a vassal you can't play whack-a-mole on his victory cities which could be a problem.

 

[hardcore_gamer]

Does he share borders with your directly or is he located on another continent? If it is the later then i would suggest forcing him to become a vassal and then give him all of his lost city's back since it means you won't have to worry about maintaining some small and a horsehockey oversea empire while also providing you with a vassal overseas thus increasing your power and influence.

But if he just borders you correctly then just blow him away and increase the size of your empire. That's what i do most of the time when allowed to choose on the matter.

 

[IAM]

It's only you and him on the continent which means he's your only tech partner so I wouldn't kill him. Capture both holy citys and the border town leading to them then vassalize. Don't leave him enough to become a problem later.

Also slave out some of those angry citizens. And get some happiness ie. monarchy would allow you to hook up those wine resources, trade the extra to Mansa for more Happy resources, and give you additional happiness for every military unit station in a city (with Her. Rule civic). Spread a uniform relegion throughout your empire and you can get more happiness from that relegion.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Just kill him. Removes the residual culture issues and prevents the problem of if he can keep his tech rate up he could sneak a space race victory out from under you. If he wasn't the tech leader I would consider vassaling him but once he's a vassal you can't play whack-a-mole on his victory cities which could be a problem.

You're...kidding right? Tell me you're kidding.

Vassals taken early in the game will never win unless the master is ridiculously negligent. Sorry, but a vassal winning space is one of the most ridiculous things I've ever heard .

You can direct research you know...and that can kind of lock the AI away from EVER teching mandatory space techs.

You can also force it out of culture civics and prevent it from founding additional religions (or teching anything that lets them get a culture wonder of significance), so again they're not going to win culture until...well the late 1900's or never probably.

They can't win any other VC as a vassal but diplo, so just don't let them control the wonder in question (in other words capture it if they have it, else just don't let them get that tech).

 

[DABegley]

Yes I am horribly negligent and ignorant. I tend to get engrossed in other game aspects and forget vassals almost entirely. I have heard of the ability to direct vassal research but have never read how to do that, I guess I should do the thread search. Also I am not good enough to win my games before the late 1900s so they could come into play. Now they never have won in any game I have played as I usually have to reduce them to a very small size before they will vassalize but a couple of times it was close enough on culture that I was worried. Can vassals trade for space techs with other AIs? That could get them able to build the components. In my games very commonly vassals of other AIs threaten to win or actually win but apparently that doesn't extend to player vassals. I apologize for my wasted statement and will refrain from posting until I gain a few IQ points.

 

[kaltorak]

. I have heard of the ability to direct vassal research but have never read how to do that, I guess I should do the thread search.

Open dialog and tell them to talk about something else. There you can ask them to research something or attack a city.

 

[hexem3117]

I had no idea you could direct vassal research. I could be SO far ahead in tech by now had I known that. BTW, for an update, Mansa Musa asked to become my vassal about two turns after I teched Feudalism...I said yes, and we've been dominating the tech race ever since. I'm teching Rocketry right now and I'm trying to go for a space win. There are two more continents, one with Sitting Bull and Toku vassal, and Ragnar with a recent Washington vassal. I settled an island with Sitting Bull, made four cities and liberated them into Justinian. Even though I've got ~4000 points to his ~2700, Ragnar's got a pretty powerful military despite being far behind in military techs, so I figure if I just build up defenses and go straight for a Space win I''ll have it in the bag. Also, I've demanded all of Mansa Musa's aluminum so he couldn't build a spaceship quickly and he was quite happy to part with the both of them

 

[kaltorak]

Also, I've demanded all of Mansa Musa's aluminum so he couldn't build a spaceship quickly and he was quite happy to part with the both of them

That's also a good idea to prevent vassals to go into space

 

[6K Man]

Cities are always more useful to me when they're mine, as opposed to my vassal's.

Take every city that could be conceivably useful, and all that culturally encroach on your land.

Vassal as a last resort.

 

[The Snug]

You're...kidding right? Tell me you're kidding.

Vassals taken early in the game will never win unless the master is ridiculously negligent. Sorry, but a vassal winning space is one of the most ridiculous things I've ever heard .

You can direct research you know...and that can kind of lock the AI away from EVER teching mandatory space techs.

You can also force it out of culture civics and prevent it from founding additional religions (or teching anything that lets them get a culture wonder of significance), so again they're not going to win culture until...well the late 1900's or never probably.

They can't win any other VC as a vassal but diplo, so just don't let them control the wonder in question (in other words capture it if they have it, else just don't let them get that tech).

Agreed. Vassals are rarely threats.

As to the issue of whether to vassal or not to vassal, I'd say it depends on map size. It's much quicker and easier to conquer a large map by making vassals. By taking vassals, you save the lives of your own troops, and you gain the addition of your vassals surviving troops to unleash immediately upon the next civ.

I once had a game where Pacal launched a space ship, so I possessed only 30 turns to win the game. I went on to conquer a dozen civs in those 30 turns. I was only able to do that because I took vassals quickly and then unleashed them upon the next civ. Each subsequent civ became easier to conquer. When the UN diplo vote came up, all of my vassals voted for me. If I had bothered to conquer every city of those 12 civs, I would have never won the game.