Forming alliances

[Bohlen]

Well, I tried some alliance strategy last night and I can see how it could have its benefits at times. I was really flying through turns, but it seemed to work fairly well on MGE. I'll have to load 2.42 on my new PC and get back to some nice diplomacy. I really have just given up in that aspect of the game in MGE due to the AI being totally unreasonable about attitudes and alliances.

"The AI is your friend."

[samson]

From what you say I'd not be surprised if there is not a further correlation between the powergraph rating and the number of civs with whom the game will allow you to maintain an alliance. Maybe it is simple, one more per place on the scale, i.e. none when Supreme, one when Mighty, two when next rung down and so on.

Makes sense to me. I'll check in future games to see if it holds.

Letting a nearby ally found a city next to your Colossus city (if you have one) may be very desirable. You can build roads and railroads up to it easily and run in caravans for higher ongoing trade routes than you can get anywhere else on the map. Railroad doubles the ongoing trade.

[East Street Trader]

Thinking about this I suppose you could actually give the damned city a leg up with some sensible land improvement.

One hassle about allies is if they do get their mits on a good shared square you can't shift them by putting a martial unit on the square.

I'll brood further on this trading partner aspect. Clearly you quick landing guys know what you're talking about on this in view of the recent extraordinary date achieved (and said to owe something to this sort of thing).

[samson]

Improving their city is smart, especially with roads to increase their trade. While you're at it, give them Republic or Democracy as soon as you can, another trade booster if they switch to it.

In my 396 game my Egyptian ally's city did overlap my SSC's radius on one square, which pinned my worker down to it all game long. I lost a little flexibility in micromanagement, but it wasn't too bad.

Doubled trade routes with railroads, you gotta love it.