Overview
An interesting playstyle for the lower and middle difficulties.
Instructions
Requires an Ancient Era start.
1. Build 3 more Warriors from the very beginning.
– Stop if you haven’t found a neighbor’s capital by warrior 2/3, or if you’re positive that you’re isolated. It’s not worth it if your first conquest is too far away.
2. Scout with your created Warriors and go for Tile Improvement techs. Go for Craftsmanship civic, for the Agoge bonus to producing Warriors.
3. Upon reaching 200 Gold, buy a Worker and use it to improve luxuries or important bonus resources (if you’re falling behind on food, production…)
4. Send your 4 Warriors to your neighbor’s capital.
5. Declare a Surprise War. Best case possible, it’s not garrisoned with a Warrior and you can siege the city. At the very least you should get all 4 in a position to attack the city ASAP.
6. Conquer the capital in two turns and eight hits. Still manageable even if the enemy has a Warrior garrison.
7. Go after another civ, or quickly settle the empty space between your two cities and go for a new playstyle.
Advantages of this strategy
• Strong second city
Oftentimes the new capital already has a district, city center buildings (Monument, Granary, doesn’t take long to repair), unused builders and (if you’re lucky) an early wonder like Stonehenge or Hanging Gardens. Not to mention a couple of population and luxuries to help your amenities.
• Strong barbarian protection
4 Warriors for 2 cities, and that doesn’t count if you keep going and build more warriors to capture a third enemy capital. That’s well enough to stop a raid, especially if you try and take out encampments for combat experience.
• No warmonger penalty
Generally speaking, civs won’t care if you take out someone else. There is no consequence. It’d be way different if that closest neighbor civ decides to invade you in, say, Medieval Era, and if you successfully take one city.
Some civs will actually love you for it. For example:
Cleopatra loves strong armies. This would help in the early game.
Gorgo loves war. This bonus quickly drops away though.
Trajan loves wide empires, and you’re probably the first one to get a second city. Be sure to maintain this bonus.
•More expansion space
Only applies if you’re a wide building empire. Your rival will never colonize, and you probably have double the space to settle. A lot of this land will be very, very useful.
Disadvantages of this strategy
• Forfeits early game bonuses
DO NOT DO THIS AS CHINA. You need to churn builders and rush wonders, rather than wasting time on conquest. It’s still okay to do this as Russia, although you’ll need to carefully choose when to divert to building Lavras.
• Slow economic development
Your monument and granary will come late. Your campus and holy site will come late. Is the delay worth it compared to a good second city? That’s up to you to decide.
• AI agenda backlash
Tomyris hates surprise wars, and Formal Wars aren’t available in Ancient Era, so she’ll hate you. Teddy Roosevelt hates warmongers on his continent, but if he’s close enough you can take him out.
Gandhi hates warmongers PERIOD. He’ll hate you even if you meet him after the war.
Hojo Tokimune will hate you if you don’t get culture/faith up. Catch up quickly.
Once you piss off someone, it might as well stay that way. Good luck in the long run.
• AI bonuses on higher difficulties
NOT TESTED FOR EMPEROR. Sometimes, 4 warriors isn’t enough when factoring in the AI’s combat bonuses.