Reason number 1 to go to war - the neighbouring civilization has a color too similar to yours so looking at the map becomes confusing, for example Persia - Poland.
I may redo this video just to make sure that's included. You work so hard to build a beautiful, aesthetically pleasing minimap blob, and then some asshat settles near you with similar colors. War is inevitable.
Notch Jonson Kill all their men, enslave every women and children, burn cities to the ground and salt the fields. And that's because I am merciful toward the enemy.
+LordScrub I know that feel. i beat back a Mongol invasion than made peace. I build up an army, lie about why they're on the border and then take his capital and every calls me a warmonger and hates me for the rest of the game
+GearShotgun If you lie about your troops being on their border, that is one of the biggest penalties to relations, the AI will never forgive you for breaking your "promise"; if you say that your troops are passing through, you can never declare war on that Civ again without taking a large relationship penalty. If the AI pre-empts you and asks why you have troops on the border, declare war on them, they won't be as angry at you. Also, going to war after the Atomic Age has the greatest relationship penalty with other Civs. Need to go to war? Do it in earlier eras or don't explore a multi-continent world for as long as you can. Civs won't know what you do if you haven't discovered them.
GearShotgun Oh god, the "You broke your promise!" penalties. In one game I was good friends with Poland, and I had some units by his borders. Of course I said they were just moving through because we were best buds. But then, he started demanding tribute from my protected city-state. I told him to stop, he said he wouldn't do it again. Fast-forward 10 turns. Poland takes tribute from the same god damned City-State. I tell him to stop again. He says he will. Around 10 more turns. He takes tribute from my city state again. I declare war, thus breaking my promise not to invade, so everybody hates me. I even get the penalties when I don't even break a promise. Like, I kid you not England told me to stop buying tiles near them and to stop settling near them. I said "No, our affairs are non of your business." 5 turns later. England complains that I "Broke my promise not to settle near their lands" and denounces me. Fuck you, Firaxis.
+omgrussian No. It takes something like 150 turns, it does go away eventually. And it is just one red, you manage to get 3 greens, you still can be friends
MrZsc I assume you meant your, and how was I supposed to know you live in Canada? If you don't know much about Lee then why even make the comment? Just a string of poor decisions tbh
i went to war with the hans because they had a city too close to where i was gonna place a city, and he had iron. then he waa saying i was bothering him because of buying lands, and he was starting to be snappy. no one will remember the hans now
Just want to say that I've been watching your videos for some time now, and they're awesome, super informative, and surprisingly helpful. The learning curve has been lowered thanks to you. Also I've never seen you without your headphones on. Cheers! :)
Lol your Polynesia game sounds awfully like when the 5th and 6th place went against the first place person. You shoulda mentioned revenge as a reason NOT to go to war. That NQ fear us revenge game comes to mind. Other video ideas that you might think about talking about. 1) Liberty vs Tradition 2) Order vs Autocracy vs Freedom 3) A tier list for civilizations. I know its subjective but a lot of people would be curious of your opinion. 4) Other tier lists such as Natural and Building wonders. Which ones are game changing, which ones you shouldn't bother with (Barringer Crater comes to mind)
If you make another one of these, could I request you talk a bit about city placement? I find it hard to think about city lands beyond simple observations like "hey look, a mountain" or "hey look, a unique luxury", so I would certainly appreciate it!
I know this video is extremely old but maybe someone watching this can answer: I’m pretty new to the game, so i try not to go to war too much, but someone settled a city 4 or 5 tiles away from mine and stole some really great production tiles with a great general. Around the beginning of the atomic era he was pretty behind in technology so I saw the opportunity to raze his city and take my land back. I also wanted to slow him down and I was scared about having such close borders to him, so I declared war and won. The war was pretty detrimental to his empire and he wasn’t a real threat anymore. I’m not sure if that was a good idea though now that I look back, and there’s no way to know because someone else won a diplomatic victory 3 turns later anyway.
Just include natural and world wonders with land quality. If your lands + wonders are worse than your neighbor’s lands + wonders that it could ultimately cost you the game, that’s a reason for war.
I'm still a noob at this game, in my second game I had to fight with babylon because I was stuck in a corner of the map with no resources and 1 city, but When I finally took babylon I had only two units left and then poland (+6 other city states lol) declared war on me and marched with a huge army to my capital. I managed to somehow defend myself because I had a trebuchet in each of my city. I couldn't hold babylon so I had to left it, eventually EVERY civilization started denouncing me, and then rome and poland (again) declared war on me, and that was the end because rome had an entire fleet and I had none (I was going for a cultural victory with greece). Btw I was playing on difficult 4 against the AI. So yeah i'm pretty bad with strategy games but my advice is never go to war because everyone starts denouncing and hating you, making your trades really shitty. (Sorry, english isnt my native language).
lol i went to war with Babylon once but they had a very good position for their capital. they had a mountain range blocking direct assault, then a 3tile gap infront of the city then more mountains, in the three tile gap there is a river, so my attack was painfully slow as they blasted away my units. at the rear of their capital was the ocean, BUT they built the city 2 tiles away from the coast so my navy couldnt take it either. i tried going around the mountain but they built several cities there just to block the path. took me until i got nukes to finally take them down after hundreds of turns in perpetual war.
In single player, I am a bit more impatient to be tested, for example when someone is sending missionaries at me or declares to ban a certain luxury (which they do know i have alot of).
Surprised you didn't mention wonders at all, especially considering a lot of wonder tier lists will literally say a wonder is "great to take, not so much to make". Have had several games where I was going for a diplomatic win but a neighbor beat me to the Forbidden Palace, so out came the guns.
I once played a game where I waged war on the other continent: I was stronger, but the enemy could get more units much faster than I could (ocean crossing took 3 turns and 6 more on land). In the end we were both completely exhausted, I only had 3 units left, I was sure someone was going to jump at the chance, when, FOREIGN LEGIONS. BOOM 6 UNITS, BOOM UPGRADED TO INFANTRY, BOOM I CAN DEFEND MYSELF... I lost that game :/
mrdog652 _-CRAZYMUFFIN-_ If you "rush atomic" you will most likely get rushed and killed. And on quick speed you should be at atomic at around turn 140 not 600
I have had 4 major wars in my game 1. Against Zulu because he steal my land in Arabia 2. Aztecs in Africa because lots of science culture bad defense 3 AMERICA they attack me with Great War infantry and take 2 islands while I fight them in Russia
I mostly play single player, I really try to avoid getting into any fight where I don't have absolute dominance, but what I will not tolerate is an aggressive neighbor. Invade them before they invade you. You can try and delay war with diplomacy, but if you leave it up to them, war will break out when they're prepared and you're not.
Hey have you considered doing videos and guides for the game Total War: Warhammer I and II? Seems like an amazing game kinda like Civ but way cooler! and the series has a 3rd one coming out May 23rd. Only asking cuz you have taught me so much about civ and i'd love that quality of guides for total war warhammer also! :)
Would you ever go to war for experience, considering a future unit? What comes to mind would be an early war as Mongolia with Chariots, building up a lot of exp on those chariots so that by the time you reach Keshiks you can easily reach logistics and chew through just about any player you choose. You wouldn't actually be required to win the war, or could go and conquer city states instead.
Probably not. By going to war, you put yourself and whomever you declared war on behind relative to everyone else. Those resources could be spent getting to Keshiks quicker instead. The sooner you get them out, the stronger they are at that moment.
That would have been a good addition, something I didn't think of at all. There's a few reasons (1) when it'd be a good addition to your empire, (2) to deny it to an enemy you're at war with, (3) because you need the location or strategic resources it controls.
What if they look at me funny?Isn't that a good reason to raze their cities so I don't have to manage their poorly placed BS? What if my friend was taking too long to do turns so I dropped just...5nukes on his cities before I got a science victory? What if I have a problem?
Wazza Doin Haha, happened to my friend the other night. He tried to steal my missionary with a Chariot archer but shot him instead. All I could say was to do it right next time. :')
Natural? No typically not worth it. If they are constructed wonders then a good Petra city might be worth it in addition to his capital if you can secure it. It depends on how far it sets you back and how you are going to win the game.
Well, the other secret is trying to avoid putting yourself in a situation that you need to go to war to win the game. If you can have the land you need and enough of everything ( production, happiness, food etc) then you are fine. The only wars u'll have will be defensive ones. Better safe than sorry. So just try to be ready to kill em all.
An old video, I know, but being a somewhat new player (250 hours played) winning a war and capturing my enemies cities always seems to benefit me. I can't recall a situation where I would've fallen behind when winning a war.
I remember once I was playing on a Real World map, and I was Greece in North America. For the whole game, I let Russia do its own thing. Once I unlocked satellites, I found out that Russia had taken over all of Europe, Asia, and Oceania with 32 cities, and China had taken over all of Africa. After declaring war twice, I realized that it would be impossible to take down Russia through war, so I proceeded to embargo Russia and all city states to starve it out economically. What should I have done?
+Polari2point5 Watch the demographics page or watch their score. It would have told you they are expanding. Also, they are going to have difficulties with science so a science victory may not have been impossible. Again, the demographics page would shed light on crucial elements here. Also, where were your scouts? The fact that it took you until satellites to find out what happened on other continents is a monumental error.
Icewind I checked the demographics page often, I was usually in the lead. Near the end-game Russia started to have more land than me. I had nuclear submarines and battleships bordering Russia-Africa-Europe, the problem was that I didn't have any Open-border treaties, so I couldn't really see how the other countries were doing.
If it's near the end game that this happened then that means he acquired those cities at near the end game. The ONLY possible way this could have been done without completely destroying his science utterly is for someone to have outright surrendered those cities in a trade agreement (in which case they must have been friends or something and they just wanted one of them to win). Also, if you were ahead in science during this time you should have been able to get hubble telescope which also should have greatly increased the chance for science victory. In any case, war was not the solution at all here because there was no time left. Just a science victory because the hubble would have been a substantial advantage to leapfrog ahead and then you would just need to play defensively.
Icewind I've had a similar situation, I couldn't get anyone to open up after I had to defend against Rome China and the Aztecs, not even after I liberated an Aztec city and have of the Dutch empire. I had happiness problems too but when I did get to Satalites I saw how pathetic some of my allies were. In the last 50 turns I had to conquer my entire continent do I could win because I left time victory on
i played civ with friends for many years and ill say my main reasons to go to war. 1 they are winning the game and i need to stop that. 2 they are Too close to me. 3 they are talking too much and not backing it up so i call their bluff. 4 I'm being boxed in. 5 I know they are coming so i make the first strike and make it painful. So i was not doing good in a game and my neighbor to the south was on fire and i was convinced i was gonna lose. But then i started catching up to him especially after recent war buffed my score points very close to his. He kepted thinking I was gonna attack him and believe me I wanted too but he had way too much defense and I know i would not beat him in a all out fight. He declared war on me cause it was almost end game. He nuked me and i nuked him back but i didn't invade his land because i didn't have the resources he had. I held my own but only enough to prevent him from taking my city's.. But at the other end of my empire i had some power and no nukes around to wipe them out so i declared war on city states and on the last turn I won the game by the score the city capture got me. Till this day i will never forget that game as I snatched victory at the last turn and i love to rub it in his face we are still friends but its a day i was very proud cause i was going to lose that game and he attacking me made me think about other ways to win when i was content on being in 2nd place. I also remember another time where i prevent losing a game by Nuking a city that was completing a science victory. Another friend and he still has not forgiven me for that. Still friends but he brings it up and does not trust me in civ games. Cant blame him i guess.
I concentrate more on gold, build my cities with lot of science and tech. Once I get enough gold lets say 10k gold and good science I then concentrate on building Atom bomb. I dont go to war until Atomic era unless the other civ gets on my nerves. My two reasons to go to war is Oil and Aluminium
Few questions, since I just got the game: You'd obviously get a diplomatic hit if you conquer a city state, but will the hit be as bad if they declared first from being allied with the enemy? If a civ takes over another early game, is it wise to denounce first then declare without being seen too much as a warmonger, or just declare war while they are vulnerable? And is the diplo hit hard when you go to war by default because of a defensive pact? Diplomacy is what is confusing to me in Civ V, as you can tell.
+Courtney Jones Just some observations I had for playing like 100 games with AI. The easiest penalty is when some one invaded you first and you got their city or the fights go on very long, this will be early concerns dark. Then it will be other AI plotting with you and you agree to gang up by declaring war, if you do not take a city, dark early concerns, if you do, red early concerns. Then it will be you declare war when they denounce you, whether you denounce back does not make a difference. Then it will be you declare war out of nowhere. Then it will be you declare war with a friend. Then it will be you declare war by breaking the promise of moving your army away. Also it is important to know that whether a civ will concern and to what extent will depend on:1. How many cities you are taking?2. Is one of the city Capital?3. Are you annihilating a civ?4. What is his relationship with the civ you are at war?5. What is his relationship with you?All these matter, but also one thing to keep in mind, just like countries in real life, they are no real friends nor enemies, everything diplomatic is about interests! And there could be only one winner!
Hard disagree. There are reasons to declare war that have nothing to do with actually taking a town. A good example is your scout notices an unprotected worker near their border in the early game. That's a zero cost setback for them, and you should always do it.
I know this video is old, but something you didn't really talk about is wonders. Not wonder spamming, but after how many wonders that you want, and they have, do you attack them? 1, 2, maybe 3 that you want?
Only wonder I've ever considered in cost/benefit is Forbidden Palace on a reachable city like Venice. Its benefits extend throughout the game as a passive bonus.
@Filthy not always true I played a game where Egypt had 9 wonders in there capital and I took there capital for the sheer amount of wonders they had and when I took the city my happiness went up by 9 instead of down from anexing
+FilthyRobot I'm curious, how do you deal with a 2 front war against two military civs. I got spawned between China and England and both rushed me with their respective crossbow ups in the medieval era. I was able to win the war easily against china, but England ran me over on the other side. Is there a way to prevent this without way overcommitting to producing army units and falling too far behind?
Reason to go to war? ♫You build this city...... I need this city to wiiin, theeee, game You build this city..... I need this city to wiiin, theee, gaaaame♫
Is it a good idea to steal an undefended worker/settler and stop attacking? I do this a lot in single player, if I see a settler coming to the lands I plan on settling, I steal it and then just defend my lands.
Against AI for sure, in multiplayer someone might hold that much of a grudge that a long war will keep you both from winning the game. So it helps if you know the players mindset.
I played Civ5 a lot. And I used to think that it's impossible to win Deity without going to war. It is possible. All you have to do is balance other civilizations, slow down the strongest by paying others to declare war on them.
In my experience the easiest way to win deity games is by never fighting aggressive wars. The AI is so bad and generating science that it's easy to pull ahead in later eras and trounce them in the space race with 3 decent cities. The only way you can really lose with proper tech path and building priorities is losing cities to wars or having to build a lot of military to survive a war at a crucial tech timing (like building pikemen when you just got university tech) Bribing other civs is good though, so you don't have to spend production building tons of military; so many times I see units massing on my border and pay their owner to fight someone else on the other side of his lands again, huge waste of time for him!
@@RaidsEpicly I usually play with random Civ and some Civs are not capable of winning science victory. At least not consistently. So in the beginning you have to go to aggressive war to slow down your neighbor, especially if it's a non-aggressive Civ with good bonuses for growth. In my experience, if I don't go to war early I couldn't catch up with them and be irrelevant the whole game. It also depends on your place on the map. Usually, if you are between 2 aggressive civs you are screwed.
Me, my brother, and the AIs were playing. I got enough cities and resources so my brother put a few cities around me. At first I was annoyed but he stopped open borders and I haven’t been attacked for a while.
lol i went to war with Babylon once but they had a very good position for their capital. they had a mountain range blocking direct assault, then a 3tile gap infront of the city then more mountains, in the three tile gap there is a river, so my attack was painfully slow as they blasted away my units. at the rear of their capital was the ocean, BUT they built the city 2 tiles away from the coast so my navy couldnt take it either. i tried going around the mountain but they built several cities there just to block the path. took me until i got nukes to finally take them down after hundreds of turns in perpetual war.
What about strategic resources? If I have no uranium for example but my neighbour is somewhat easily conquered, should I do so? And also, if I have the option to otherwise settle a city somewhat far away where there is uranium, would that be the better alternative?
Does your neighbor have uranium in this situation? If so, but he doesn't have a-bombs, then you should conquer him ASAP. Notice if he has the technology to mine it, or build a-bombs. You should also check if he can reach your important cities (a-bombs have 6 hex radius and 2 hex blast radius) Also, you should always settle the uranium, if you have happiness for that.
There is only one reason for me to go to war: if one (khm.. or two (looking at you Mongolia and Japan from my last play)) civ declars war on me in every 40-70 turns and defending my self consumes my growing options. Than I use one peace-time to build up a pretty insane army, destroy them to the point when they turn from proud roaring lions to helpless baby-kittens, and continue to build the most flourishing civilization ever known to mankind.
FilthyRobot True, but what about the fact that annexing cities increases the cost of social policies, and makes getting national wonders more difficult? How many cities would you expect to have at the end of a typical multiplayer 6 person match? Four fully integrated cities seems to be the gold standard in the single player community.
FilthyRobot What is the happiness difference between normal cities and puppets? I know when you annex its a lot more unhappiness, and then you build a courthouse to negate it.
You could also raze it and build a city of your own, the benefit is that you have already improved the tiles and generally have it connected to a road... ^^
+Radicaldanny You also lose the remaining population, and any tiles outside the initial expansion range that were purchased or acquired through cultural border growth. Not to mention any buildings that are already in there...
I started the first proper war me and my housemates have ever had in CIV 5 (In our 20 or so games we've done) and managed to just scrape a victory. It was either I go all out and frigate bomb one of the other team's coastal players and turn it into a 2 v 1 (the 1 being a god at Science games in CIV 5). A teammate down, he still managed to nearly XCOM my capital but we won diplomatic through sheer economic power. Wars are fun but it was an awkward couple of days after xD
That's why I turn off diplo and science/time victories, no one will sneak his way to the victory, but has to earn It through hard building cuture, or military, like a man.
The usual reason I go to war is resources. If I don't have oil, iron or uranium in my land, I will invade for it. Trading does me no good. I don't like to be at the mercy of other civs or until the agreement expires. I want my own resources. Second reason is if someone goes around bullying others (ironic, I know) because they may later become a threat to me.
You don't need iron for anything except Frigates, which is only a problem if you're coastal. And I actually object to the oil problem making sense. If you teched to biology with the expectation of a GWB push (I don't know how you'd be prepping a battleship push considering someone will Frigate murder every coastal town every game), only to discover you had no oil, I genuinely don't know how you could successfully invade at that point in the game, since you A: clearly don't have artillery and B: are in the industrial era. Genuinely that's an assume fetal position and cry moment in MP, because your game is dead. No uranium is a fair call though, that is a very good reason to go on a murder spree.
Turn 8: Arabia offers declaration of friendship. Turn 10: Arabia declares war. Turn 15: Arabia refuses peace. Mayans declare war. Turn 16: Arabia proposes peace. Britain declares war. Me: Can I just farm this wheat please?... Turn 478: Shoshone have launched 93 nukes at...well it doesn't exist anymore.
My prob is that I get bored after a few hundred turns and look for the smallest excuse to go to war. Like someone I traded and allied with all game took 1 hex from my city with a general's citadel and it was fking go time!
Another reason to go to war - another nation, one you don't care about if they disappear or not, manages to build that Wonder it took you 20 turns to get, just as you were about to have 1 turn left before it is complete.
I have not yet played civ multiplayer, but i did play free for all in other strategy games. Basically the more players, the harder it is for war to be worth it because all the players that are not in a war will be benefitting and the one who can keep himself out of the war the longest is usually the winner of the game. Even when 1 player is going to win, it doesnt seem very useful for another player to attack that player because the best he can achieve is that another player is going to win but not himself. Espescially in civ where geograpy is important you kind of need the neighboring players to stop one from winning which might not be the #2 and #3 How do people in your no-quiters community stop a player from winning ? Do you have rules of conduct that when people agree to team up on a #1 player ensure everyone contributes its fair share to this war, or will everyone be contributing minimally hoping the other players will make the investment so that they have a chance to win ? Does it happen for example that everyone supports the player neighbouring the #1 with gold and units and are there rules of conduct to make that work ? I imagine there must be some kind of system to prevent the #1 player from winning peacefully.
It's the only way to be sure. They know this on the bottom of their vile hearts, the developers. That's why they included the option to make a city a puppet. Once you have puppetized all the capabilities of your opponents, the game is yours to win as you see fit.
Sometimes I go to war with an AI if they keep propossing that I get embargoed. I completely wipe them out if I am powerful enough. Also, I only do this if everyone already hates me.
I war 100% of the time, is the most fun I have in the game I currently use Mongols because that ability to take down City states really helps when they all declare war on you xD but I always have problems with Gold... What are the best Civs for War?
Shiny YEA I didn't know either, but if you upgrade them 3 times for open terrain they get a shoot twice upgrade!! It's total ownage! It's interesting how you unlock special upgrades depending on the combo of previous upgrades. I forgt the name for the one that shoots twice but just get 3 straight open terrain combat bonus and you unlock it! :) Also you have to make sure your Kashiks don't die in combat and that you get all the barracks EXP bonuses so they gain levels when you build them! :D Also pt.2, never upgrade Kashiks! the melee horse SUCKS but if you rush tanks the Kashik -> Melee -> Tank, the tanks fire twice too! :D
You didn't mention fake wars? That is, I know some people who will declare war on literally everyone they meet, just to conduct scout pillage raids and worker captures in the early game, then never accept peace offers, since they see no reason to conduct trade, and it means they can suddenly attack later in the game without announcing they've gone to war. Also just stuff like attacking an archer escorted settler with their ruins promoted spearman to get a free worker and deny an enemy forward settling them.
Hey, I was just wondering if stopping a civ from spreading their religion when u already have a very useful one and u ask them to stop but they don't, is that legit?
+TU hope you are still playing this game....In SP, being a warmonger does not really matter, because AI does not really know how to gang up. They gonna gang up on you only when you are essentially among the weakest and they covet your lands. As long as you stay in the first half of ranking, they could hate you as much as "fearing you gonna sink the world into a New Dark Age", but none of them dares to declare war on you.But you cant trade with them when they hate you.Up to immortal it is all like this, no idea on Deity. I play with my friends often with AI. Humans you know, very inconsistent in Friendship and War, so AIs hate us really soon and really badly.
+雾盗虹 Well I had a different situation in full SP, I don't remember of it was king or immortal but I started with Austria in a small and really poor continent, I was in the middle of score when Portugal betrayed me and ganged with half the civs in the game then I became one if not the weakest player in the game, soon Portugal estaished a trade embargo on me and 98% of the Ai declared war on me. This only happened once and maybe due to the game settings but I think that once you have someone with you the Ai will be more afraid towards war with you.
+TU This might sound counterintuitive. Only scout your immediate area (roughly a 10 tile ring around your capital). You will likely meet one or two civs by the time that you can gear up for war. Then completely eliminate one neighbor. You will have gotten a fair amount of cities from it, and ideally, you wont have angered any other civ. Even if you had two neighbors and you kill one, then you just deal with one angry civ for the rest of the game, which is not that bad. Last game I played (Carthage), I only had one (land) neighbor, the Aztecs. That was a difficult war (expert note: don't fight a land war through jungle early game with the Aztecs), but I actually completely eliminated them in the early game. Upon searching the seas (I now had an entire small continent to myself), I met England. I stopped exploring, embarked my units, built up a quinquereme and galleass fleet, and stormed England before they could become a threat with the Ships of the Line. I couldn't finish off England, but they were permanently crippled. Once other civs got caravels, of course I met a lot of them. But I'd already killed or crippled my two main competitors, and no one except England was the wiser. At this point in time, due to your massive empire, you can effectively snowball, and then blitz the remaining civs one by one (or two by two) in the late game. While this method doesn't always work, I'd give it a 75% success rate. As for the 25%, that is when you meet too many other civs early game, or if you are playing a late game civ surrounded by powerful early game civs (ex: playing America, with the Zulus, Assyria, and the Aztec). In that case, expand, but don't overdo it. Focus on growth. More likely than not, someone will attack you. Keep your units (which should be defensive focused) near your city. You should keep holding until their units are in full retreat. Pursue them, killing as many as possible. Especially once you cross into enemy territory, they are likely to cede a city to you, without you gaining a warmonger penalty. Between your strong core, and your weakened neighbor (they did spend production on like ten dead units, AND they lost a city), you should now have a slight advantage over your other neighbors. Chances are good that that first aggressive civ will attack you again (out of vengeance). If not, another civ likely will. Rinse, wash, repeat. The whole purpose of this is to take advantage of the game's shitty AI. You have a DEFENSIVE military, but you butchered their offensive one, so they will still surrender a city to you. Anyways, you will now have a sizable empire, strong core, weakened, war-weary neighbors, a strong defensive military, and no warmonger penalty. While not as ideal as the first scenario, you should have a decisive advantage over your neighbors. The trick will be to maintain your strong growth/science output, and to gradually convert your defensive military into an offensive one, and then blitz your weakened neighbors. I know your comment was 4 months ago, but hopefully this will help some. SOURCES: I've played Civ V for 954 hours, consistently win domination victories on King and Emperor (I haven't actually played Immortal or Deity).
What about a city which has accumulated too many wonders early on, and even if you are behind in tech, it's like, objectively better for you in the long run to take a city which has, for example, Great Library?
Accumulating wonders early on likely means they didn't spend that production on other things that will help them. Like units. In that case you can go for an early victory over them before they become much stronger, which even the AI did to me.
I won the battle but I lost the war. Its just negative happiness and gold and then the barbarians appear around my capital all the while waiting for the cities I claimed to burn to the ground turn by turn.
+FilthyRobot Nice video, props. Also, did anyone ever tell you that you look alot like the English comedian Jon Richardson? static.bips.channel4.com/bips/orig/videos/362ab326-bf7f-49f1-919b-197329dc51ba.jpg
+StillRooney The gf denies any resemblance. However, she claims I look like Van Gogh (www.google.com/search?q=van+gogh&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj66vKj5rPKAhVD8CYKHSqdA0AQ_AUIBygB&biw=1920&bih=920#tbm=isch&q=van+gogh+self+portrait). We're clearly proving subjective realities here!
Alright so, say early game, you're playing as Russia, and Babylon is your neighbor, you know he's got writing and you've got your additional hammers from your UA. Its early classical era, so may or may not have Walls of Babylon yet, do you think because of how early this is it's a good idea to attack?
Aye mate, we should play sometime. I'm trying to gather members of my EUIV group to play but I'm not having much luck. Are you interested in hosting a large mp game?
