(Reposted by WUM)
This is Stiel´s strategy for war:
- Be prepared before you go to war. Defend your homeland, just in case.
- Isolate your enemy’s capitol by bombarding, bombing and/or pillaging ALL (rail)roads around the enemy’s capitol IN ONE TURN.
- This way you enemy will be deprived of strategic resources. They can’t build the most modern units anymore. If you land your infantry on a mountain while at war, the AI will commit suicide. See this thread. After that your enemy can only build ancient troops, which will make the war FAR more easier!
- Also your enemy will be deprived of luxury-resources and will probably fall into disorder, especially when you get other civs also to declare war or make a trade-embargo against you enemy. This disorder will prevent your enemy to build new (weaker) troops, so you can almost run him over completely.
- Next turn, you conquer most of his cities, BUT NOT THE CAPITOL, keeping the smaller ones, razing the bigger ones. (where you have your settlers build new cities to fill up the open gaps. those cities will profit of the infrastructure that’s already there)
- Then, you ask for peace, demanding all his money (lump sum) and possible techs and the remaining cities, so he will only have the capitol left.
- You DO NOT conquer is capitol, unless you conquered ALL of his other cities. This way the capitol won’t move and the civ is completely crippled.
- You can also choose to let them live with a few cities. You can use them as slaves by demanding money from them every now and then (this makes up for the corruption and waste you have to live with in you newly conquered cities).
If somehow you need a couple of turns more to do this or get reinforcements to keep the conquered cities occupied, DO NOT FORGET to KEEP the capitol completely isolated. Not one road should connect to their Capitol.