What does sacking a capital city do ?

[norman96]

Hi guys. First time poster! Sorry if this a noobie question (I searched for an answer but haven't had any luck finding it.)

I was wondering if someone could tell me what (if anything) special stuff comes from taking over a capital city. I'm planning a war right now and I was wondering if it was worthwhile to attack the enemy's capital first. If I take out their capital, do I get more treasury money, more tech, or does it greatly increase the chances of other cities revolting?

Thanks for any tips on this topic.

Oh: should mention I have Beyond the Sword.

 

[war ensemble]

You get a certain sum of money, which differs depending on the age you are in. You will not get any techs or make other cities revolt. The former will happen if you end the war by demanding a tech off the other country but they may not take it. Other cities may revolt if your culture starts to dominate theirs but that works independent of taking cities.

Also, capital cities are usually in good geographical locations so it might be in your best interests to keep that city. Plus it usually has good infrastructure built in already.

 

[norman96]

Ok cool war_ensemble thanks. I'm new to Civ 4 but have been playing the earlier games in the series, and I seem to remember (might be wrong) in those older ones if you took out an enemy capital it really caused serious havoc with that civ, making their cities more likely to revolt , because of the way corruption was handled I suppose. The new Civ 4 makes sense though .

 

[xcrissxcrossx]

Usually if you take over a capital city, either by sacking or keeping it, it will make the civ WAY more likely to be willing to capitulate if you researched feudalism. That is a good reason to go straight for the capital.

 

[King Pluto]

Most of the map generators create very strong capital locations with good food and a strategic or happy resource. Keeping a powerhouse city will help you long-term, but also may help speed up your war efforts.

 

[avdale]

No immediate effects in terms of revolts etc. However if the a.i loses its capital its starts to go into damage control. It is hard coded to stop any attempts at culture victories iirc and attempts to pursue peace often by capitulating to a civ (not necessarly you unfortunately.)

 

[CouNterOrdeR]

I think its best to go for the enemies best city first. Its often the capital, especially early on.

 

[Jet]

capital cities are usually in good geographical locations so it might be in your best interests to keep that city. Plus it usually has good infrastructure built in already.

For a new player, this is the important strategic thing to understand.

However if the a.i loses its capital its starts to go into damage control. It is hard coded to stop any attempts at culture victories iirc and attempts to pursue peace often by capitulating to a civ (not necessarly you unfortunately.)

Yes, it is.

 

[Nares]

Taking a capital will end a space launch attempt. It's possible that the ship needs to have launched already for this to be effective.

 

[CarlH]

Taking a capital will end a space launch attempt. It's possible that the ship needs to have launched already for this to be effective.

This is the only inherent difference in taking an AI capital. And yes, it does need to be launched already.

 

[jst666]

I don't have Beyond the Sword (yet), but as far as I've seen with vanilla is that the capital tends to have 3 times more defenders and troops (very rough approximation). By attacking the capital you might end up spending a huge amount of time and troops taking it. But after that, the rest of the country is more easy prey. With the same effort you might easily take 2-3 other cities. Also another point is that AI seems to launch vicious counter-attacks, to which she uses troops from the capital also. In this way you might be able to destroy most of the opponents troops on field-battles, instead of them fortified in a city.

 

[duckduckswan]

In early games capital cities usually have the best production for a civ, thus by taking their capital you handicap their ability to create new units. Beware the whip however. and welcome to the forums!

 

[vormuir]

In Civ II, yes, capturing an AI capital could cause the AI's empire to suddenly split in two. That doesn't happen in Civ IV.

There is only one game effect to capturing a capital in Civ IV: it kills any AI spaceship. Otherwise, it's just a very good, very well defended city.

Oh, and when any capital is captured -- yours or theirs -- the Palace is automatically rebuilt in the largest surviving city, making that the new capital.


Waldo

 

[vormuir]

Oh, and: when attacking a capital, come loaded for bear. The BtS AI is much smarter than in earlier versions, and will defend tenaciously. Some of the more annoying tricks include whipping/drafting extra defenders, rush-building walls or castles, and suicide attacks with siege units to weaken your approaching stack with collateral damage.

It can be frustrating, but it's that much more fun when you win!


Waldo

 

[vormuir]

Actually, that last point bears repeating:

THE BTS AI IS SMARTER.

It's smarter than the Vanilla Civ IV AI, which in turn was smarter than the Civ II/Civ III AIs. If someone had pointed this out to me back when, it would have saved me a lot of grief.

The BTS AI is still not as smart as a decent human player, but it is competent, it knows the rules down cold, and it is capable of springing some fairly nasty surprises. Prenez garde.

Waldo

 

[Ermak-]

it destroys the morale of a hog in multiplayer, which pushes him to quit - effectivly giving you the sweet El Victorie!

 

[Calouste]

If you want to capture a capital after the early game, make sure you bring a large amount of units (unless it is a last-ditch attempt to cancel a space or cultural victory).

First, as already pointed out above, it will be well-defended. It will also be fairly central in the empire so the AI can bring in more units quickly.
Second, also pointed out earlier, the AI may capitulate to a third civilization, in which case you suddenly have double the war on your hands.
Third, the AI will have generated a lot of culture in the city and the surrounding tiles. Either you need to garrison the city heavily to prevent it from going into revolt (it can't flip back under the default options, but a city that is in revolt half of the turns is not much use either), or you need to capture neighboring AI cities to take the cultural pressure off.

 

[UWHabs]

It's not always that well defended. If it's deep in their territory, they don't necessarily guard their back door. I found a cap that only had 4 units in it in the 1950s. Okay, I'd just finished off a stack of about 40-50 units on the other end of their empire, but they don't always guard it like crazy.

 

[KeloGBites]

Spaceship Launch blitz, use nukes and paratroopers to stop it. But in any other case, it's best to advance from your territory to their core (or from an allies territory)since that capitol city you capture will be so squished by their culture that it will be utterly useless (and razing it really does nothing besides wasting hammers on troops that may have died during the attack) until you capture all the surrounding terrain as well.

 

[karadoc]

(and razing it really does nothing besides wasting hammers on troops that may have died during the attack)

That's so not true. The goal of war is not always to capture land. Sometimes the goal is just to cripple an otherwise power opponent. Razing their capital is a good way to do this without the need to invest in all the resources required to setup and keep a bunch of captured cities on foreign soil. Razing the capital is especially attractive when the goal is to prevent a cultural victory.