so, what are the ins and outs of razing/abandoning cities?

[pauli]

i seem to recall that the ai takes a dim view of the player razing or abandoning cities, especially if they owned them at one time. is this true, and if so, what are the rules for it? i've culture flipped a few cities that are in rather awful locations. some have been mine for over a thousand years, and are thus fully assimilated; others are not. what am i risking by abandoning them? what about razing cities i capture?

[Sarxis]

You could also relocate the citizens (ala Settlers).

[Cerbykins]

I happily abandon cities of mine...the ones you make in expansion at the edges of your empire - if they get threatened. And if the AI gets it's cities back, it can expect to lose them again

Although...

If a civ annoys you, and you only manage to seize a couple of cities, give them to another rival to REALLY cheese your opponent

Done on Firaxis-given Huge Earth Map, Regent. I had the entire Americas, and hadd trouble bashing the Russians out of Australasia. Only managing to get Moscow and expecting to promptly lose it again, I had a nice idea - I gave it to the French

By the time I was REALLY ready to pay the Russians the visit they deserved, it had JUST flipped back - in time to get taken again

Anyway...
Only abandon cities under threat. Even if it's in a lousy place, it gives you score
It SHOULDN'T take a dim view of you, as you aren't committing genocide against it's people. No promises, though

[steven8r]

I don't know any quantitative effects of razing. Perhaps it increases everyone's dislike for you by 1 or 2 per razing. I don't think you actually get penalized (reputationally) for abandoning cities. You lose citizens and culture, but I don't think you take a rep hit.

Even the most far away and corrupt cities, you can set them to produce Wealth. You'll get more gold/turn out of them than if you abandoned them.

If you are dead-set on abandonment, take Anun's advise. Rush a Settler/Worker and relocate your city.

[kring]

On abandoning cities, you do take a rep hit if there are more foreign citizens than your citizens; you need the number of your citizens to exceed the number of all the other AI citizens. It is treated like razing a captured city if there are more AI citizens than your citizens.

Bamspeedy posted an article on attitude a while back:

AI Attitude

[maas]

Usally if you raze a city after about 5-10 turns you find a city in its place and if your at war with that civ they will use that as there drop off point for units. once i waz the english i had expanded rapidly and the aztecs were right on my doorstep ,i culterly flipped a aztec city and razed it as it was poo then 6 turns later the zulus who im at war with *** build a city there they used it as a drop off point for there 1000's of impi warriors

[Paddy]

ahhh Leave their Cities in Ruins anyway

it is good for your complextion and their arrogance levels

[Vince278]

I've done it to other people's cities on those huge maps where I quickly hit the 512 city limit. That allows me to build more of my own where I want.

[Brundlefly]

I once received a city in exchange for peace. When I then went to war with that civ's neighbor, I gave the city back to its original owner when the enemy was about to attack. The city had no culture yet the enemy was able to occupy it instead of razing it. Is this a bug?

[steven8r]

bfg, When a city 'goes back' to its former owner, either via gifting, taking, or Culture-Flip, it regains its former culture level. It just may not have had any of 'your' culture.

Also, if it has any improvements it will be available for occupation.

Only size 1 cities w/ no improvements/culture (I think) get autorazed.

Steven

[Brundlefly]

Originally posted by steven8r
bfg, When a city 'goes back' to its former owner, either via gifting, taking, or Culture-Flip, it regains its former culture level. It just may not have had any of 'your' culture.

Also, if it has any improvements it will be available for occupation.

Only size 1 cities w/ no improvements/culture (I think) get autorazed.

When I received the city via peace treaty there were no cultural improvements of any kind in it...

[Vince278]

I've started to notice I was getting size 1 cities now without autorazing. Is that a change?

[Cerbykins]

If it had culture before, and the civ whose culture it was lost the city, the improvement wth the culture goes too. Therefore, the evidence of past culture is a little well-hidden

[Rommel2D]

Are cultural improvements retained if a city is traded?

[Kuciwalker]

No which means even Libraries and Universities go.