Keeping a city

[Hannah!!]

So military victory now seems impossible. I defeat a city, and they rebel in like 6 turns, even if i have a governor there, so how the F*** are you meant to keep them?

[Laladen]

Keeping a unit garrisoned in the city. change policy cards to give garrisoned units give more loyalty and governors more loyalty.

[tempest.of.emptiness]

Also:
- Choose which cities to attack based on your chance to keep them. (This means not attacking cities that are far from any of your own cities, and targeting peripheral cities before going after cities located more deeply in the enemy's territory.)

- Amass a large enough attack force to be able to capture more cities before the ones you have currently taken will rebel.

- If necessary, subdue a city and then move on to the next without capturing it, then capture multiple subdued cities simultaneously so that they will exert pressure on one another. (Remember to keep ranged or siege units near the subdued cities to prevent them from recovering or repairing their walls, and a melee unit nearby to take then city when the time comes.)

- If you capture a city and you know you won't be able to keep it, don't waste resources developing it. Move away (to the next target), so that when it rebels the units that spawn will not interfere with your attack force. If you keep momentum then you may be able to reduce enemy pressure on the city and prevent it from returning to your enemy's control. Neutral cities don't exert pressure for your enemy and don't build units for them, so a free city is better than an enemy city, and represents a (small) step forward for your war effort. Eventually you may be able to reduce enemy pressure (by effectively converting their cities to free cities) enough that you can retain control of the enemy cities that you capture. Later you can return and recapture the free cities (possibly after the war has ended).

- Razing a city in a key location (that you would not have any hope of keeping) might make it possible to hold other cities by reducing the loyalty pressure on them.

- If all else fails then raze everything and rebuild with your own settlers once the enemy pressure in the area has been neutralized. (This will have severe diplomatic repercussions, so take that into consideration before going this far.)

[RJ Dork Bard]

What tempest said . also i believe converting them to your religion helps.

[Dray Prescot]

You can NOT keep control of just ONE City when there are several/many other Cities nearby that are NOT under your control. You need several nearby Cities, preferably some that you owned before starting the invasion, to keep control in the medium term. The right Governors, Policies, Governments, Religious Beliefs, Occupying Units, Gold Age, Buildings, etc. can all help.

[Martin]

Wipe the city out, don't bother trying to appease people, just kill them all. A good life lesson.

[ShuFlngPu]

The Zulu are extremely proficient in this.
Basically, this comes down to 2 factors.
#1 Loyalty count (+1-+2/turn usually)
#2 Number of citizens in city.
Other things that affect loyalty but not limited to:
#3Proximity to other civs city (must be at least 10 squares away for 0 pressure)
#4 Certain governors
#5 a city that is not governed takes loyalty pressure from other civs if anywhere near it.
#6 Policies.

Cities passively generate loyalty=civs. little loyalty causes that civ to revolt aand then join the side with more pressure, akin to how culture could capture/instill chaos in Civ Revolution.

Spies can also perform revolt operations, given they have access to a housing district and can ALWAYS deseat a governor that you must then reassign aand wait 5 turns. (Itll never cause you to auto-lose the city tho as they will be back in power at ~50% till revolt)

The zulu have a unique ability to give extra loyalty when city is garisoned and even more when a corps/army does it aand they get the aability to BUILD them sooner via Encampment.

Note: Razing a city to the ground prompts EXTREME warmonger penalties and pretty much every AI in the gaame will war you if able within 10 turns or so. lol.
Warmonger penalties dont matter unless you are looking for culture victory... Or if you cant defend yourself from everyone in the game nearly aat once. :P

In my opinion, this method is best used to break up stalemates and to win games with low map space for sprawl.
As you need minimum 6-9cities to win the game, its kinda like religon is to culture- another way to break stalemates.
Causing an enemies city to revolt while never declaring war on them is aa POWERFUL maneuver in this game aand allows you to take cities without ever declaring war. -WONDERFUL if you are trying to win via culture but your neighbor is a donkey.

[Hannah!!]

but in the very early game you don't have governers or the necessary policies to do all of the above? So i need to wait then? My tactics have always been, take all the nearby cities before they build walls, and before i get serious penalties.

I suppose this tactic is now impossible!

Darn it.

[Lemurian1972]

Originally posted by hannahjones1030:

but in the very early game you don't have governers or the necessary policies to do all of the above? So i need to wait then? My tactics have always been, take all the nearby cities before they build walls, and before i get serious penalties.

I suppose this tactic is now impossible!

Darn it.

Taking cities in the early game isn't as hard. Lower population means lower pressure.

[JuiceDay]

Aim for high pop cities in a cluster as they give more loyalty pressure. Capitals also give more pressure so be aware of that. It's even worth it to start moving in to capture another city right after the first one if you can. If you have enough army and can afford to do it, keep cities at low HP without capturing them until you are sure to capture the other city soon.

[Andy]

Originally posted by hannahjones1030:

So military victory now seems impossible. I defeat a city, and they rebel in like 6 turns, even if i have a governor there, so how the F*** are you meant to keep them?

Station a governor
Use the military policy card hat rewards loyalty for a Garrisoned unit
Use the diplomatic policy card that rewards loyalty for a district.
Trade for amenities and raise the amenity level.
Have a nearby city with an entertainment district do the "Bread and Circuses" project
Build an entertainment complex.
If there's a city state nearby, use the governor power to reduce nearby loyalties.

There's actually about a dozen more obscure strategies beyond that.