A capitol idea

[rpodos]

When going to war, take out the AI capitol first.

A couple of points:

* Use one large stack. I am torn between fastmovers to get it over with quickly, or slow movers to stay alive. Depends on what civ and UU you have. Use vets and maybe a good defensive Army.

* Travel on hills and mountains, preferably.

* Do not be the first to attack. If you strike force is large enough, and on hills / mountains, you will probably not be attacked on the way. Put a damaged unit or a worker on your side of the border, and wait for the AI to hit it. This will help with warweariness.

* Depending on location and / or GWs, either capture or raze the capitol. Watch where the new palace is formed... if farther away from you, retreat. If closer to you, take it out also. Bonus: if the new capitol is unattached to the AI's road network.

I think this will result in a number of benefits:

- Reduce the likehood of culture flips when you capture nearby AI cities. This is because you are both "pushing" the AI's capitol further away, and because you have destroyed the cultural value of the original palace.

- Reduce the productive capabilities of nearby AI cities.

- Reduce the productive capabilities of the AI core cities, as well as, obviously, what was one of its industrial centers, the capitol. For militaristic AI civs, probably one of the main boot camps.

- Capture a likely location of GWs. Also probably a great city location, as the AI civs seem to get good starts.

Think Desert Storm. After the steel rain, troops just give up.

R

[Arrian]

The capitol is usually their best city, in terms of culture and production, so taking it out is often devastating. Forcing their capitol to leapfrog further and further away from you is definitely a good way to lower the probability of culture flips, but I find that the best method is simple to overrun the enemy as quickly as possible.

If you can push the AI's cultural borders back such that they do not enter the 21-square radius of a captured city, you greatly lower the chances of a flip. Thus, blitzkrieg is doubly powerful. This is why I love mobile attack, and am willing to lose a unit or two so I can sustain momentum. I will often charge right into AI territory with a large stack of horsemen, put them on a mountain, and accept the 1-2 that get beat up or killed. My footsloggers just can't keep up, and the speed of conquest usually makes up for the casualties.

If you are a religious civ, and you use an early rush, you are pretty safe from flips. At least that's been my experience. With Japan, I've done a LOT of conquering over the course of 4 games and have never had a flip. I've even been keeping capitols.

-Arrian

[rpodos]

Arrian:

I agree... mostly.

I think I did not make clear the strategic objective of the capitol ploy, as I have it in mind.

In the Roman game I am still playing around with, I have expanded just about as far as I want to, mostly taking land / cities from the Greeks and the Persians. I have built an awesome Army:
3 Knight Army
35 add'l Knights
Two 3 Legion Armies
38 add'l Legions

My problem is that Egypt is just too big, with 32 cities (and I need somebody to fight!). I want to mess Cleo up in the maximum way. I could do this by just invading and razing a bunch of cities, but they would be outposts anyway. I want it to reaaallly hurt...

Our borders just touch, and their is a pretty good path along a line of mountains and hills that will get me three tiles from Thebes. Fortunately, both her single iron and single saltpeter are on the path!

It's a long way though... 17 tiles, although fortunately her biggest city, Heliopolis, is even further. Actually looking at the map, when I cut all the roads, I'll be right near her only horses, so I'll pillage that too.

Given the distance, I am going to use exclusively Knights... the Army and maybe 10 vets.

I'll probably raze some of the border cities too, just for promotions and GLs.

Call this a war of aggression, as opposed to a war of expansion.

R

[rpodos]

Man, I almost feel bad for Cleo.

I've razed 5 of her border cities, including an 11 pop. I've pillaged her iron and saltpeter. 5 other civs are now at war with her.

And I've got a 3-Knight Army, and 8 ind. Knights, on a mountain 3 tiles from Thebes.

Does anyone know how to say "goodknight" in hieroglyphics?

R

[rpodos]

I negotiated a deal with Persia to ally against Egypt... and they are executing the capital ploy!!

Persia bypassed two smaller cities, and has 4 Knights ready to attack Thebes, just as my strike force is arriving.

Worst case, Persia weakens Egypt tremedously.

R

[Beren]

I have had some bad experiences with capturing ennemy capitols. They will often accept peace, but the city will be overthrown in a few turns. (It doesn't really matter whether you have peace or not.) I only attack major cities if I know I can destroy them in a few turns after. Of course you could raze the city.

[Dominae]

rpodos, your idea about "going for the capitol" is a perfect example of goal-oriented warfare.

All of my wars are goal-oriented. I'll start a war to deny a civ a resource, or to get another civ to attack them via MPP. If you've got goals, I think you tend to accomplish them. If you just "go to war", you'll be a lot less successful. Goals build upon goals, until you've conquered an enemy civ.

For example, planting a stack of Spearmen on the Romans' only source of Iron near Veii means they won't be able to produce Legions. Pillaging the roads to Veii means Roman reinforcements will be late in coming. Setting up a good defense around Veii means the reinforcements will have their work cut out for them. Finally, capturing Veii adds another city to your empire.

Thinking this way, in my opinion, is a lot better than: "I'm going to war with Rome; I think I'll attack Veii".

Capturing an enemy's capitol is a particularly nice goal to accomplish!


Dominae

[Txurce]

When I don't have the gaining of resources as a goal, I'm usually fighting to either expand or just to cut a tall poppy down to size. On these cases, I make the enemy capital my first target whenever possible. If I can't, I go for the largest city first. This changes the balance of power the fastest, especially in the first half of the game. I raze these major captures almost every time, as they would almost inevitably flip back.