Taking City States - yes or no?

[Scoojitsu]

I often read that early on you should take any city states closeby. I'm wondering why that is.
Is it because they are basically like a free settler? Are they always placed on a good location(with good resources)?

On the other hand, do you not lose out on the envoys and boni you can get from them? Trade routes etc..
I'm not sure what to believe here. Any tips appreciated!

 

[The Highwayman]

If you declare war on them you lose any current envoys you have. And by taking the city state you would lose out on any available bonus they give. Free cities at the beginning of the game is huge, regardless if they belong to other civs or city states. More often then not they're in decent locations, but I've seen some terrible spawns too. You have to weight the pros and cons of taking them vs letting them live. Here are some examples of how I choose to take or leave them:

Take the CS:
The bonuses they yield doesn't coincide with my desired victory type. For example, I don't build too many Theater Districts when I'm not going for a Tourism win. Therefore, if a Culture CS spawns next to me, that city is probably mine.
My starting location has me boxed in a corner and a CS is blocking me. Sorry guys, gotta make room.

Don't take the CS:
It's a CS with great bonuses like Toronto or one of the gold or Science city states that will greatly help me all game long.
My Civ's unique abilities can take advantage of the CS bonuses that lend themselves to any victory condition.
The CS is so poorly placed or it's so out of the way I don't want to invest the time sending my troops over there to take it.

 

[Acken]

Sometimes it's very worth it if you don't plan on investing envoys there.

 

[Joebles]

It depends. If the city is in a good location and I don't really care about their bonuses (especially the suzerain bonus), I'll try to take it - especially if I can snag it in the ancient era so there's no warmonger penalty.

An extra city, already built up a little with improvements and maybe even districts is worth sooooo much more than just a settler, especially because once you capture a city state, there's no negative occupation penalties since the war ends immediately.

 

[VicRatlhead5199]

I've decided 1 CS is enough if it gets you easy access to an actual civ on the other side. I have no problem swallowing a CS or two that I'm not a Suzerain of if it gets me to the juicy Civ satellite cities on the other side.

My current game I captured Amsterdam so I could get easy access to India on the other side. Took 2 Indian cities and captured a settler. Got my empire off to a rocking start.

There are some I really hate capturing though like Stockholm, Toronto, Carthage and a few others. I guess you really just need to weigh the benefits.

 

[McGreggD]

It can be worth it to declare war on city states early to steal builders or farm their troops for XP. You don't have to take the city if you don't want.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

Sometimes capturing a City State makes sense just to deny Suzerain status to an AI Opponent, who may have invested 10 or more envoys for control of it. Best done, when its bonus does not help your victory condition at all.

 

[AlazkanAssassin]

I've been tending to capture city-states that are closer to me than the nearest AI civilization. I need to kill someone with my army before the ancient era closes or I feel that I missed out. Whenever I try to go more peaceful and build things other than so many units, I end up getting attacked by someone anyway.

 

[Baradar67]

Want the pyramids for the builder bonus but have no deserts? Grab a city. Need a harbor to fill the quest for a city state you really want to be suzy of? Grab a city.

 

[whacker]

The great thing about conquering city states early is that you will get a city that has better infrastructure than any of your cities. Usually there will be at least 3 improved tiles, monument, granary and sometimes even a 3 charge worker.

 

[VicRatlhead5199]

Gotta remember, its not like V where you'll inevitably ally them all. You can only get so many envoys. If its not a CS you get the free envoy for first meeting it's fair game IMO. You'll meet or even liberate more later.

 

[isau]

Kill them if a rival has a lot of envoys invested there. Try to defend the ones you're invested in.

Only downside is when you kill one, enemies start pooling their envoys into whoever is left. So make sure you're really invested in the two or so City States you want.

 

[OscarYU]

Destroy it if it gave me the mission 'train a galley'

 

[Bluetooth]

Sometimes capturing a City State makes sense just to deny Suzerain status to an AI Opponent, who may have invested 10 or more envoys for control of it. Best done, when its bonus does not help your victory condition at all.

That’s how I usually do it. No need to capture a City State if you can benefit from it.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

That’s how I usually do it. No need to capture a City State if you can benefit from it.

Agreed.

If I wiped the current Suzerain, I often became the new Suzerain without using more than 6 Envoys. Best if you really want to be Suzerain of this CS. So, it can be more advantageous to wipe out a Civ that is Suzerain to a CS you want than capture a City State you don't want.