Sit on your allies resources to block their workers.

[Possibility]

In the last game I played, I was the first to discover coal, but the only coal resource in my empire had an allied AI unit sitting on it. It was at the end of a peninsula and the AI unit was parked there for several turns from some reason. I was unable to move my worker on to it because it couldn't occupy the same space.

This got me thinking that I could easily block all the coal mines in the game. I was the first to discover the tech so only I could see them. I could put a scout or a free worker on each one denying any AI allies from using the resource once they discovered the tech.

Yeah, its a cheap tactic and I'll never do it, but just saying. BTW, the AI eventually moved the unit off the coal after a few turns.

Possibility

 

[stormerne]

This is a fairly common tactic. No need to feel bad about it!

However, it's also worth pointing out that all sorts of blockades are worth considering. For example, if a civ attacks a friendly city state, but (for whatever reason) you don't want to declare on that civ right now, you can spam the state's lands with your units and give the attackers no way through. Anything that makes it through the defensive blockade will get little support and be quite vulnerable. Moreover your passive but intimidating units, that it daren't fire on, will make it easy to negotiate a cheap peace on the state's behalf.

 

[Martin Alvito]

There are lots of things that are worth squatting on. For instance, if you don't want the AI to found a city, build a Settler and use the helpful little icons that recommend city sites to know where you have to squat. It will either repeatedly try to enter those tiles or go somewhere else.

 

[Zhahz]

Dunno about "tactic" - cheese maybe.

It's just another thing that testers apparently never reported or the devs never cared about. There should be diplo options like "open borders doens't mean take up residence, move your units that are parked in my lands" or "I notice you're a coward who won't fight to protect a city state and is instead using 1UPT cheese to block my troops - this means WAR" (or the AI realizes it can't beat you and gives up but puts you on it's hated list anyways).

 

[King Rad]

Yes, I had five units surrounding a city state that was located on the ocean, so the only way through to it was through my units. the AI kept landing units and the city state would bombard them. This was also a military city state, so periodically it would also give me a unit, which I then used against the other power on the continent, which I was at war with (and had originally protected the city state from). The city states like me so well that all I have to do now is reach the tech, build the UN, and win a diplomatic victory, with minimal actual warmongering on my part against the other AIs. the one located on the continent where I am (different from where I'm protecting the city state), declared war on me; and the city states there all declared war on him, essentially protecting all except for two of my cities from even being close to his being able to launch an offensive.

 

[Sonereal]

Dunno about "tactic" - cheese maybe.

It's just another thing that testers apparently never reported or the devs never cared about. There should be diplo options like "open borders doens't mean take up residence, move your units that are parked in my lands" or "I notice you're a coward who won't fight to protect a city state and is instead using 1UPT cheese to block my troops - this means WAR" (or the AI realizes it can't beat you and gives up but puts you on it's hated list anyways).

That's what I was thinking too.

Because it's too easy to say that your troops are "peacekeepers" and against human players, this tactic wouldn't work (for too long at least).

But against AIs? They should be able to demand you move your troops if they think you have too many in a certain territory. For instance, Civ A invades a City-State and Human player has troops in the territory but isn't at war with CivA. CivA should be able to demand Human Player to "exit" the territory.

Oddly enough, I guess if players decide they want to play a roleplaying MP game, they could always act out humanitarian intervention by placing troops on key food resources.

 

[donp2112]

This is why I never accept Open Boarders from anyone, can't see any reason to do it (unless you are fighting a common enemy) and if you do you end up contending with AI units aimlessly wandering your turf getting in the way of your units. Anyone have a good reason to accept Open Boarders?

Rejecting Open Boarder requests hasn't seemed to spoil any relations, as the AI will apparently DOW for completely random reasons. For example, in my last game one of the AI civs made a comment to the effect, "You have a huge army there fella and can probably kick my tail." Next turn he DOW'd and yup, got his tail kicked.

 

[Jerrymander]

Blocking units that are attacking a city-state may not be viable after Optics, unless its a land-locked city-state. Just sayin'.

 

[hellboy909]

This is why I never accept Open Boarders from anyone, can't see any reason to do it (unless you are fighting a common enemy) and if you do you end up contending with AI units aimlessly wandering your turf getting in the way of your units. Anyone have a good reason to accept Open Boarders?

Yeah, it would be nice if you could rescind an Open Border agreement without going to war.

 

[lilnev]

I sell my Open Borders for 50 gold (30 turns). I don't particularly need to wander around their lands (usually; I can always buy access if I do), but I can use the cash.

 

[eoc]

Never open borders when playing Civ5, my worker was always blocked by "friends'" scouts, it sucks.

 

[mzprox]

Blocking units that are attacking a city-state may not be viable after Optics, unless its a land-locked city-state. Just sayin'.

Sometimes it is better to not fully block the city, just prevent them to surround it, so the city can bombard/kill them one by one

 

[DaveMcW]

Your worker isn't blocked by your own scouts, why should it be blocked by an ally's scouts?

 

[pi-r8]

Your worker isn't blocked by your own scouts, why should it be blocked by an ally's scouts?

I don't know, but that's how this game works. I'm hoping that it's just a bug. It's really annoying.

 

[alpaca]

My scouts are also blocked by their gazillion workers when trying to scout. No idea why they coded it that way but I think it was on purpose.

 

[Horizons]

God, this game needs a patch or three so badly.

 

[shinkicker]

Yeah, it would be nice if you could rescind an Open Border agreement without going to war.

I'm having that same problem in my current game. I had spread out to cover about 85% of my continent and had already wiped out Montezuma in the process. A few hundred years later, here come the Russians and the Arabs trying to settle next to me.

The first war destroyed the Russian empire, reducing Catherine to 2 tundra cities and a caravel.

The second war resulted in the nuking of Baghdad. Unfortunately, I got a little trigger happy and forgot about the blast area including some Siamese units. Guess I have 2 wars to fight, now.

 

[City Raider]

Yeah, I never accept open boarders anymore. I didn't really accept them to begin with when I started but after being hounded one game I finally gave in and then found it incredibly hard to work my land when I wanted to b/c of scouts or whatever constantly moving through and blocking me. In just reinforced a worry I had, so now I definitely say no everytime.

 

[nicotine]

There are lots of things that are worth squatting on. For instance, if you don't want the AI to found a city, build a Settler and use the helpful little icons that recommend city sites to know where you have to squat. It will either repeatedly try to enter those tiles or go somewhere else.

Heh, if you can predict without the settler what the good spot is, you don't even need to build that. I found a spot in my last game, where a city got razed that was surrounded by 3 gem resources. I could see the "razed city" tile, and wanted to plant my own city there, but saw another civ moving a settler towards it. Planted a spearman on the tile, watched the settler sit one tile away and not move for 9 turns until I had a settler down to take the site.

 

[lounahtic]

i block hex alll the time... especially when i'm getting paid 20+ gold a turn from a civ for peace treaty... then some AI comes up and decide and kill them off and take away my 20+ gold... screw that... i might not have the army to challenge you but i'm sure as hell gonna park my dudes in your way and let you get pelted by that one archer inside Moscow...