To Raze or Not

[Zilch]

I tend to be quite an agressive player and enjoy raging wars on the AI CIV's. With the new city maintenance costs I'm having trouble effectively carrying out wars.
After I have captured a few enemy cities my economy starts to take a hit and then effects my science etc... etc... Is the only way to combat this to have an economy that can cope with the extra cities the same way you would when expanding early in the game or should I be razing a lot more than I do (which is hardly ever.)

 

[Astax]

I raze like a madman unless its a city really worth keeping or if the game would end soon since Id get better score for not razing. Yes razing is good, you cant be bothered with the expenditures :/

 

[Samson]

I think you need to understand how the city maintaince is calculated. It is described in http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=138473

Note that the position of the Conquerers Palateau is probably level dependant.

Basicly, you need to have an idea of the maginal cost of the captured city, the approximate money you will get from it, how much you can afford, and how much it is worth to you, especially milatarly (base for healing and cultural control).

I usually find I keep a few to get good cultural coverage, and rase the rest.

 

[Zhahz]

It's situational but I tend not to raze cities unless it's early and it's an undeveloped or new junk city.

Early on a research hit isn't a big deal (to me) if I end up with a lot more cities, because having that many cities early means I'll get to develop more cities that in the end will produce a lot more research.

Later on I'm loathe to raze developed cities because they'll usually have several buildings and improved tiles, and the AIs are often cottage happy, so once those types of cities leave resistance they're nice moneymakers.

 

[eg577]

When deciding to take a "not particularly interesting" city the question I find myself asking is how feasible is it to get the city to produce at least +2 food surplus and at least 5-6 shields.

5-6 shields, for the first half of the game, is enough for the city to slowly build useful infastructure like marketplaces and courthouses, but it won't be doing much else. You want +2 food minimum because the primary purpose of a satellite city is to grow and work more cottage tiles/water tiles or to make more specialists.

 

[Din Ohtar]

I've played too many games where I've attacked early with horses/axemen, taken their cities, and then seen myself losing money with science at 0%. its then courthouses, lower civil, and no more war while I try to get some money coming in so I can put back science to something decent.

These days I raze in the early game, and then keep the city when I'm confident that I can afford it.

Sure I may just be destroying some wonder in the razed city, but I'm not inclined to save / attack / keep the city / see if the city has anything worth keeping. if not then its reload / attack / raze the city and not keep it.

Its a BIG BUMMER to be losing money due to cities, but you can't abandoned them. Maybe in patch 1.10 ?
m

 

[Penitent]

I like the way CivIV works, I always end a war early on in serious debt, losing something like -30 gpt. You just have to chill out with a few turns of peace to reduce war weariness and build some courthouses.

 

[rabottens]

Having pyramids help you can go to police state and cut that war weariness down to nothing. Without it you need courthouses and put some money into culture for temporary happiness relief. War weariness can bankrupt you if left unchecked. Nothing worse than internal strife over fighting a war not worth fighting if you don't believe me ask Bush.

 

[Astax]

It woudl appear from the rumors on the newbie board (ie general forum) that after patch palaces arent destroyed by conquering. This gives you an incentive not to raze enemy capitals I have yet to test this thou, and I suspect the person posting this might be an uncredible newbie, but its worth checking.

 

[duxup]

If I plan on taking the entire enemy nation that I’m taking then I’m more likely to keep the city rather than raise unless I think the AI placed the city in a crazy spot (it happens sometimes).

If I'm just planning on taking a couple cities then I'll often keep the closest cities and raise the new border cities in order to push the enemy borders back and give my cities some breathing room.

Of course, all of those choices can be trumped by cities that have some great features like a wonder or are just really good quality cities.

 

[Merzbow]

I rarely raze because invariably the razed land will be settled in a couple turns by somebody else. Raze if there is a specific civ you want to damage and you don't care about giving the land to some other civ (which is what effectively happens).

 

[DrWu]

That city maintenance graph is great!

 

[DrWu]

uncredible newbie

Astax
Warlord


Join Date: Oct 2005
Posts: 209

Pot\kettle?

 

[Samson]

It woudl appear from the rumors on the newbie board (ie general forum) that after patch palaces arent destroyed by conquering. This gives you an incentive not to raze enemy capitals I have yet to test this thou, and I suspect the person posting this might be an uncredible newbie, but its worth checking.

I took an enemy capital this lunchtime. In a couple of hours I will check, but if anyone fancies it here is the save. This is massive if true, instant forbiden palice just where you need it, and will be a warmongerers boon.

[EDIT] I just checked, there is no palice in my captured capital. I suppose it does not prove it conclusivly, but I thik it is unlikely you get a second palice by capturing an enemy capital. Too much of an advantage.

 

[Astax]

Pot\kettle?

When did the game come out agian? BTW I played all 4 civs just cause I didnt find this sorry site doesnt mean a thing. He was a newbie cause he was supposed to post pictures of the captured capitals, he placed 3 pics and only 2 had palaces in em. There was no way to even tell they were all fromt he same game. And it looked to be liek he was playing a huge map, altought thats more carebearish.

 

[FenrysWulf]

I'm quite surprised by all those who raze cities. I would never raze a city unless it was too close to one of mine. Yeah, it hurts your science early in the game, but if you raze it someone is just going to go and build a city there again. Half of the time I go to war because I don't like the enemy having cities too close to me, so why let them build another there again? (And yes, everyone is the enemy). I guess I've never seen the economy get so bad that I was down to 0% research. the worst I've gotten is 40%. Maybe other people are declaring war a lot earlier in the game than I am.

 

[Control Group]

I'm quite surprised by all those who raze cities. I would never raze a city unless it was too close to one of mine. Yeah, it hurts your science early in the game, but if you raze it someone is just going to go and build a city there again. Half of the time I go to war because I don't like the enemy having cities too close to me, so why let them build another there again? (And yes, everyone is the enemy). I guess I've never seen the economy get so bad that I was down to 0% research. the worst I've gotten is 40%. Maybe other people are declaring war a lot earlier in the game than I am.

Or you haven't taken enough cities. One of my early games in CIV ended in disaster when I had failed to grasp maintenance cost, and hung onto seven captured (from barbarians) cities, for a grand total of 12 cities. Research dropped to 0%, and my workers were suiciding left and right. I was down to no non-garrisoned units (and nowhere near enough of those) by the time my economy began to recover.

My research had been suffering for long enough that I hadn't even managed to get any of the techs enabling my cities to produce wealth/production/commerce, so I had cities cranking out Jaguars who were disbanded as soon as they were finished.

Right about the time I got my research up to 30%, my friendly neighbors to the East declared war on me, and I lost four cities within six turns to their rampaging war elephants. Turns out the AI will declare war on you despite good relations if you're perceived to be weak enough.

Anyway, the upshot is: yes. Raze cities unless you know they're going to bring in enough coin to offset their costs. Or at least, don't take another city until the first one has a courthouse.