War: Tactics, Strategies, Tips & Tricks - discussion thread

[MightySpice]

Oke, so how exactly do i transform a town to a city? I played a game to the exploration fase, but was left with one capital and two towns.

 

[vorlon_mi]

Oke, so how exactly do i transform a town to a city? I played a game to the exploration fase, but was left with one capital and two towns.

Money. You should start the Exploration Age with some extra cash/gold, which can convert one of your towns to a city.

The game usually gives you a choice about whether you want to shift your capital to one of the other towns. If you choose that, you would need to spend gold to promote the former capital back to a city.

 

[Feyd Rautha]

Oke, so how exactly do i transform a town to a city? I played a game to the exploration fase, but was left with one capital and two towns.

There's an option with a gold cost at the bottom of the town screen

 

[MightySpice]

Ah, am i correct that this is not possible until exploration age? That would explain it.

 

[wesplaysciv]

Ah, am i correct that this is not possible until exploration age? That would explain it.

No you can create cities any age

 

[wesplaysciv]

Welp, I am beyond confused now. Just transitioned from the exploration age where I had 3 fleet commanders and 11 naval units all packed and I ended up in the modern age with 3 fleet commanders and 0 naval units.

Maybe there’s a bug when they are packed? All mine transitioned but I didn’t have them packed

 

[wesplaysciv]

I don't understand how you're supposed to play a military campaign when you can barely conquer anything due to the settlement limit. Feels like there should have been something like "enemy capitals don't count towards the limit." You're not gonna start a game and just jump immediately into conquest out of just your capital, you'll probably need at least three or four settlements just so you have a source of reinforcements that isn't 30 tiles away. Then you can sort of conquer one civ and then... do you just stop? Was that it? That was all the warring you were allowed to do in the entire antiquity era? Because you certainly can't just keep going. It doesn't make any sense to continue warring just to raze cities because you don't benefit from that at all and will cripple yourself with stacking permanent penalties to your unit strength (which is an absurd concept, by the way--give me diplomatic consequences, don't make my soldiers lose muscle mass because they successfully annihilated their enemies.)

And all the while, I keep asking myself: "Why am I taking these cities anyway? I could settle much better ones myself. There's more than enough land, half the continent will still be unsettled by the end of antiquity. Why am I saddling myself with penalties in order to take cities that are worse than what I could have built myself, closer to home?" I'm not actually gaining anything from conquest, I'm just doing it for the sake of the gameplay. It's like I'm paying for the right to enjoy combat, not using combat to further my interests.

There are so many features and mechanics that revolve around war, and yet the game's fundamental design makes it feel kind of pointless.

You can also raze cities. You also get the legacy points I believe whether you keep the settlements or not (at least in Modern age… I forget for the other ages)

You can also go over the cap

On my current play through on diety most land is settled In antiquity so war becomes more necessary

 

[BlobRoss]

Does anyone have any idea what the "Military Sabotage" espionage action does? I completed one just now and the message that normally tells you the effect was just empty, as if they hadn't added that text yet.

 

[Feyd Rautha]

I believe that will make their units cost 20% more production (and thus gold). It might delay replacement troops by a turn. Given the influence cost, however, I would imagine it's not worth it.

 

[evonannoredars]

I don't understand how you're supposed to play a military campaign when you can barely conquer anything due to the settlement limit. Feels like there should have been something like "enemy capitals don't count towards the limit." You're not gonna start a game and just jump immediately into conquest out of just your capital, you'll probably need at least three or four settlements just so you have a source of reinforcements that isn't 30 tiles away. Then you can sort of conquer one civ and then... do you just stop? Was that it? That was all the warring you were allowed to do in the entire antiquity era? Because you certainly can't just keep going. It doesn't make any sense to continue warring just to raze cities because you don't benefit from that at all and will cripple yourself with stacking permanent penalties to your unit strength (which is an absurd concept, by the way--give me diplomatic consequences, don't make my soldiers lose muscle mass because they successfully annihilated their enemies.)

And all the while, I keep asking myself: "Why am I taking these cities anyway? I could settle much better ones myself. There's more than enough land, half the continent will still be unsettled by the end of antiquity. Why am I saddling myself with penalties in order to take cities that are worse than what I could have built myself, closer to home?" I'm not actually gaining anything from conquest, I'm just doing it for the sake of the gameplay. It's like I'm paying for the right to enjoy combat, not using combat to further my interests.

There are so many features and mechanics that revolve around war, and yet the game's fundamental design makes it feel kind of pointless.

You can go over the settlement limit, you just get a happiness penalty for doing so. Getting additional war support against you due to razing is the diplomatic consequence. It's effectively your enemies getting stronger due to public support shifting towards them because you've destroyed cities.

Being a mindless warmongerer that destroys everything in their path naturally isn't going to be a very advantageous strategy. What were the reasons for doing so in previous games? It makes a lot more sense to target specific cities you want for their resources, wonders or potential yield adjacencies (especially since you can overbuild what the AI built in the next era.)

 

[MightySpice]

Q: when i discover writing, i can discover writing ii. Why would i do that? I sea that all the time. Brons working and brons working ii.

 

[CoconutTank]

Q: when i discover writing, i can discover writing ii. Why would i do that? I sea that all the time. Brons working and brons working ii.

Masteries are basically leaf techs/civics that unlock more stuff. Writing 2 in particular is very important imo b/c it unlocks the ability to steal techs/science from other civs. Discipline 2 is pretty important imo since it unlocks the Gate of All Nations, which I think is an excellent wonder to have even if one isn't intending to go to war.

 

[wesplaysciv]

Masteries are basically leaf techs/civics that unlock more stuff. Writing 2 in particular is very important imo b/c it unlocks the ability to steal techs/science from other civs. Discipline 2 is pretty important imo since it unlocks the Gate of All Nations, which I think is an excellent wonder to have even if one isn't intending to go to war.

If you don't research writing 2 though, do you still get to steal tech in the exploration+ ages?

 

[CoconutTank]

If you don't research writing 2 though, do you still get to steal tech in the exploration+ ages?

Hmm, I haven't formally tested this myself, but at this point I think the answer is yes, you still get diplo actions from previous eras, even if you didn't explicitly research the relevant tech/civic to unlock them. If I do find out otherwise, I'll come and update this post.

 

[The Mighty Quinn]

Being a mindless warmongerer that destroys everything in their path naturally isn't going to be a very advantageous strategy. What were the reasons for doing so in previous games?

Sometimes in Civ VI the loyalty mechanic made it difficult to retain cities once you'd captured them, and it could be advantageous to just raze them and send a settler to build a new city in that spot. In Civ VII I haven't encountered any situations where it seemed to make sense to raze a city

 

[vorlon_mi]

Sometimes in Civ VI the loyalty mechanic made it difficult to retain cities once you'd captured them, and it could be advantageous to just raze them and send a settler to build a new city in that spot. In Civ VII I haven't encountered any situations where it seemed to make sense to raze a city

Agree. In other games in the franchises, "raze and replace" was a tactic that was frequently used. Civ3 and Civ4 come to mind as well as Civ6. In those games, the AI would often choose a bad position for city placement, e.g., just off the coast, which prohibited building a harbor.

 

[CoconutTank]

I've razed cities about 3 times now over all the sessions I've played, mostly when I was sure I could overcome the war support penalty for the age.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

I don't understand how you're supposed to play a military campaign when you can barely conquer anything due to the settlement limit. Feels like there should have been something like "enemy capitals don't count towards the limit." You're not gonna start a game and just jump immediately into conquest out of just your capital, you'll probably need at least three or four settlements just so you have a source of reinforcements that isn't 30 tiles away.

I'm the opposite I've found war much more rewarding in Civ 7. You need to have a reson though, play the map, if you're warring early it means there's an AI nearby so their cities should be your 3rd and 4th Settlements I don't see much value in warring over settlements 30 tiles away.