WHy SHOULD the AI respect your borders??

[dexters]

And on another note, Borders are a human creation, in real life, do you think god will come in and throw out illegal migrants that are intruding your border?

No. You had to defend it yourself, as said earlier.

And if the enemy AI intrudes on your border constantly, it means it
a) does not respect your culture
b) wants to pick a fight

And picking a fight is usually what is happening. Talk to them in diplomacy and they'll want to declare war on you at the drop of a hat. let them. you'll have less war weariness to worry about if they declare war on you.

But i can't stress enough that you need to garrison troops in forts at key points around your border, usually with cannons/cataputs/artillery, enough so that you have a pretty good cover of all the possible entry points for an invading army.

In a previous war, the Aztecs jungle warriors streamed though my borders like there was no tomorrow. I had artillery set up bombarding the incoming units and using my riflemen to finish them off. Then i cut off the border crossing they are using, trapping their Army and killing it. I then took the war to them, took their Capital and several big cities, and now the the Aztecs are licking my boots. I've effectively extended our peace treaty for another 20 turns, with substantial per turn gold tribute from the aztecs

[Gyromancer]

Originally posted by Field Marshal Klesh
.... Whats worse is that I was waiting in the next square over with a settler and 2 workers who were clearing some forest for a city site of my own.
...
-FMK.

Uh, correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't the act of building a city automatically clear the forest/jungle away from that square?

[HalfLotus]

This may have been said already, but if you have a few squares that are not in your borders yet and you see an annoying settler going for it, just put a unit (read:warrior) on the square. No more annoying cities.
I just let them build the city usually. It's a waste of resources for them, and I usually absorb it anyway. Them I can give it away for a couple of techs.