culture/city defection

[Master Marcus]

So far the culture/city defection is awesome and works well starting in the Middle Ages. By 940 AD I have 2 american cities ( including a 8 pop Houston ) defected to me ( Regent level ). Do not hesitate to build Library and Temple as soon as possible in frontier cities.

It was a good choice of mine to choose the culturally strong Egyptians as my first enemy. In the NorthEast, the culturally weak Americans can wait. For now I prefer let them trying to overthrown their nearest governors .

If you want to conquer, always attack a stronger culture first. Then you'll maximize your military efforts and avoid futile conquests that you can have by defections.

[Grunthex]

Mostly it seems to me the AI isn't much interested in improvements so it's awfully culture-vulnerable. While they'll occasionally throw up a temple, or maybe even a colosseum in a size 10-12 city, they never have things like libraries... never mind the culture, how's it supposed to keep up in research?

[Yohan]

What level are you guys playing at? I'm playing at Regent, and I'm about middle of the pack as far as culture. I took over an Indian city and it defected back to the Indians 2 turns later. Their culture was only barely better than mine. I have never had a foreign city defect to me because of my culture. Now, granted this is my first game, but you guys must be doing very well to encounter AI countries with so little culture.

[Sarxis]

It seems that some AI civs are more interested in culture than others. I have seen AI civs have TWICE the culture as me.

[Grunthex]

Originally posted by Anunikoba
It seems that some AI civs are more interested in culture than others. I have seen AI civs have TWICE the culture as me.

Yeah. I take back all the criticisms/questions I had. In my current game, everyone (7) on my continent is nice and peaceful, and except for the French on the far side, they're not terribly cultural although they are reasonably advanced. The other major continent in our game is full of cultural dynamos, and they're in a 4 way free-for-all.

It's so nice to have the Good guys and the Bad guys.

[Master Marcus]

Originally posted by Anunikoba
It seems that some AI civs are more interested in culture than others. I have seen AI civs have TWICE the culture as me.

I think the map configuration and generation has a crucial importance here. I play at Regent, still my first game so have made some mistakes, but only the leading civ ( Japanese ) has a significant cultural advantage over me. 4-5 others are really close to me though by 1100 AD.

[Barry Brenesal]

Originally posted by Yohan
What level are you guys playing at? I'm playing at Regent, and I'm about middle of the pack as far as culture. I took over an Indian city and it defected back to the Indians 2 turns later. Their culture was only barely better than mine. I have never had a foreign city defect to me because of my culture. Now, granted this is my first game, but you guys must be doing very well to encounter AI countries with so little culture.

This has been pretty much my experience. At Regent level, I'm about par for culture. But then, I think it has to do in part with your opponent's AI preferences. Unlike Alpha Centauri, they don't have such a huge plus and corresponding minus in different areas as to cause really lopsided games. (And MOO II was even more like that.) I find that even expansionists like the Indians consolidate behind the lines as they keep thrusting new settler units ahead.

[HalfLotus]

I was the Babylonians (religious, scientific) and ended up way ahead in culture because my temples and cathedrals were cheaper. I suspect it would be a different story with other civs.