Is war the BEST strategy?

[Harovan]

Originally posted by ducki
I say no to the thread title.

It might be the most effective, but to me "best" entails more than 2-tiles between cities with zero improvements but hordes and hordes of units.

It needs to be a good builder to be a good warmonger. Both together make up a good player. What you're describing will work for the moment, may be in a tiny pangea game, that never gets out of the ancient age. Under other circumstances, it won't work for long, because you'll have a terrible economy and will fall back in science. Horsemen fail bloody if they meet muskets, you know, and extorting techs for peace won't work forever.

Yeah, I know that's oversimplifying. Sue me. I'm still new to warmongering, but I still try to war as little as possible while still warring effectively.

Nobody will be sued here. We're all here to learn.

[Alex]

Most of the time, yes. War is the best strategy. As ducki said, it is usually the most effective one, not necessarily the best, but it is a sure winner. Besides, the game is currently geared towards war.

[joncnunn]

If the AI weren't so bad at war, there would be fewer war monglers.

[TacticalGrace]

War is great if you win.

Not so hot if you lose.

[Fried-Psitalon]

This is one area in which I think Civ does justice to "the real world," at least in the more ancient eras. If you were the stronger power pre-A.D., absolutely war was the best idea. Over time, though, as your neighbors find out who has a habit of beating on who, you find yourself more and more alone, with less and less treaties as the warmonger. Get too much of a reputation for it and you'll find the other countries of the world ganging up on you to beat you down- just ask Saddam. (Very rough interpretation of the Iraq-Kuwait situation, not the current one, apologies for inaccuracy.)

In Multiplayer, war is absolutely the best and only strategy. In SP, war is a tool, like any other. Is it more efficient to build up this town or take that one? Costs, benefits. I've won games on Monarch without launching a single war- it's tough, but doable. Usually, 'correctly fought' wars are over resources someone else has, that you don't..... which is actually very realistic if you think about it.

[joncnunn]

Attitude of the civ with the spare stategic resource towards you is also important:

If they are Gracious, you'll probably get a good deal for the resource buying it at the right moments and leting it lapse when you don't need it. (Say with Oil, buying it right when Mobile Warfare is discovered, building lots of Tanks for 20 turns, then letting it lapse until Sythenic Armor, and reactiving it to upgrade all Tanks & Infentry into Modern Armor & Mobile Infentry.)

But if their annoyed, your probably better off taking it over with your military.

[ducki]

If you want to see some game descriptions where war as we normally think of it is not an option, go check out the AU 203 game.
Game thread - http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...threadid=72862

Spoiler thread - http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...threadid=72863

You can see some players doing rather well without waging a war of conquest until Communism, believe it or not, and at Monarch-Emperor levels.

It's a lot of work, don't get me wrong, but sometimes more work is more fun.

[Nor Me]

Originally posted by joncnunn
Attitude of the civ with the spare stategic resource towards you is also important:

If they are Gracious, you'll probably get a good deal for the resource buying it at the right moments and leting it lapse when you don't need it. (Say with Oil, buying it right when Mobile Warfare is discovered, building lots of Tanks for 20 turns, then letting it lapse until Sythenic Armor, and reactiving it to upgrade all Tanks & Infentry into Modern Armor & Mobile Infentry.)

But if their annoyed, your probably better off taking it over with your military.

I've tested this and the attitude of the civ makes no difference. Furthermore it's cheaper to buy Oil before you discover a tech which allows something good with it. So you can get it almost for free before Combustion and cheaply again when you finish the industrial era

[joncnunn]

In my own games, civs that are furious with me always give worse deals both ways than those civs I have better relations with.

[Fried-Psitalon]

Originally posted by Nor Me


I've tested this and the attitude of the civ makes no difference. Furthermore it's cheaper to buy Oil before you discover a tech which allows something good with it. So you can get it almost for free before Combustion and cheaply again when you finish the industrial era

Erm, with all due respect, this is patently untrue. Now, if you tweak a Civ's attitude in one or two turns and then look for a major change in how much they'll pay/charge for something, no change will be evidenced. If, on the other hand, your Civ has been on good terms with another Civ all along, they're going to be more willing to deal with you.

It's been proven many times that Civs have long-term memories of treaties and deals- this is merely one more case of it. Instant changes? They're not dumb. Long-term behavior? That's another story. Easily tested: Save a game at a certain point, then play 50-100 turns or so treating a Civ like your best friend, and 50-100 turns or so harassing his units and skirmishing his cities. As long as the economic strength of the country remains a constant, you'll see noticeable benefits to behaving civilly with your neighbors.

[Nor Me]

Originally posted by Fried-Psitalon


Erm, with all due respect, this is patently untrue. Now, if you tweak a Civ's attitude in one or two turns and then look for a major change in how much they'll pay/charge for something, no change will be evidenced. If, on the other hand, your Civ has been on good terms with another Civ all along, they're going to be more willing to deal with you.

It's been proven many times that Civs have long-term memories of treaties and deals- this is merely one more case of it. Instant changes? They're not dumb. Long-term behavior? That's another story. Easily tested: Save a game at a certain point, then play 50-100 turns or so treating a Civ like your best friend, and 50-100 turns or so harassing his units and skirmishing his cities. As long as the economic strength of the country remains a constant, you'll see noticeable benefits to behaving civilly with your neighbors.

I'm sure this is true of things like military alliances but I've never seen it for resources.
A simpler test, which has the merit of distinguishing bilateral attitude from multilateral reputation, is load a save and pillage all of one resource you control and compare prices between civs.
I tried this on 3 random saves. The differences in price were never more than 10% and often couldn't be explained on an attitude basis.
In one game I would be able to buy saltpetre from 2 polite civs for a minimum of 1653 gold and could make peace with a furious civ and buy saltpetre for 1684 gold.

So if there is an effect, it is insignificant compared to timing and probably not worth playing to.

[joncnunn]

What your noticing is additional factors involved for resources (and luxaries)

Perhaps the largest factor for luxaries is how many other luxaries the buyer already has. (The more they have, the more each additional one costs.)

Second most important factor is population of the buying empire.

And at the end is the relationship modifer.

For strategic resources, what can currently be built with the resources is probably the largest factor.

Second is # of cities in the empire.

And at the end of the relationship modifer.

Techs are simpler:

Primary determinates is base cost and how many people around have that tech.

Second is a discount if the buyer has the tech partually researched.

Third is relationship.

In any case when you are the one doing the buying a tech or resource or luxary, you can notice the difference that relationship makes much easier than when you are selling it, because more factors are constant when you are buying.

I'd say that 31 gold is worth paying attention to in your example, athough unless I want to upgrade a bunch of Knights to Calvary in the near future I won't be buying Saltpeter at any price.

[Nor Me]

Most of that is known:Partial and pointless formulae: resource cost

Attitude is one of the things I don't know about.
I would imagine it to be a multiplier so when you aren't on a huge map, the 31 gold out of 1684 size effect would be insignificant.

[Feckan Eejit]

war is always the best policy

[Tattila the Hun]

Ever played a game where you're Allways at war with Everybody? Quite fun. Naturally one can make peace from time to time, but declare war right away.