Civilization 5 City-States Guide

Strategies and Tips for CS Alliances in Gods and Kings & Brave New World

City-State Allies provide Bonuses & gifts of Luxury and Strategic Resources

City-States are entities separate from Civilizations in Civ 5. Their role in the game is up to you. You may choose in one extreme to ignore them, but that would be unwise. Even one City-State Ally can provide a big Happiness bonus to your Civilization by providing Luxury Resources. This Guide will teach you all about City-States, list the various types and the bonuses they provide by Era. We'll also discuss means of generating Influence with them and how you can determine how many turns your Alliance will last.

City-States

City-States keep pace with the Technological level of other Civs through the hefty bonuses they receive. City-States are typically harder to capture than another Civ's because they receive bonuses to defense. This is offset by the fact that you won't typically find yourself in a huge War unless you're attacking a CS another Civ has pledged to protect. Know however, that you may be seen as a Warmonger if you conquer a City-State, depending on the other Civs in your game and how bad they hate it. Genghis Khan's Mongolia excels at attacking City-States.

How CS Influence Works

At 30 Influence, you are considered a Friend to a City-State. At 60, you're Allies. If another Civ is Allies with a City-State, you must pass them up in Influence to take this over. When this happens, there is often a diplomatic hit because you've stolen their Alliance. So, those who want to avoid War or who have already angered another Civ should watch whose relationships they begin to meddle in. Giving Gold gifts to City-States along with Quests are the two single largest ways to gain Influence.

Each turn, your Influence with the City-State will degrade by -1. You can reduce this by playing Greece or Adopting Patronage (25% reduction). City-States of the same Religion have influence fall another 25% faster - so with Patronage and shared religion, you would lose only 1/2 an Influence point per turn. At 100/60 you would have 80 turns of Alliance unless another Civ passes your Influence with Quests or a Gold gift.

City-State Personalities

A City-State's Personality largely dictates the types of Quests it will give you. Neutral gives a balanced approach, while Friendly will not often ask you to engage in hostilities or denounce other Civs - they'll prefer asking you to build Wonders and connect roads to your Capital. Irrational City-States give some random Quests that may include asking you to denounce other Civs, demand tribute of other Civs, etc. Hostile are the worst - their influence drops fastest (50% faster) and they will often give you warlike Quests.

Abusing City-States: Stealing Workers

It is a common practice to steal a Worker from a City-State by sending a Military Unit to capture it, declaring War in the process. It is commonly used to overcome AI bonuses on difficulties like Immortal and Deity. You can get a peace treaty next turn, but it will take up to 50 turns to recover the lost Influence. You can do this to other Civs as well, but it's safer to perform this strategy on a City-State, for their influence will recover over time. You can also ask City-States for tribute, which is covered in-depth at the bottom of this Guide.

City-State Alliances and Friendships

While at Neutral with a City-State, nothing special happens save you're trespassing in their territory, causing a hit. Do this enough and you will have them angry with you for a long time (up to -60 Influence). City-State relations improve over time at +1/turn when they are negative and not at war (better with bonuses that reduce influence drop rate), so minor encroachments will be forgotten in due time. What is most interesting about City-States are the Friendships and Alliances you can gain, which will benefit your entire Civilization.

City-State Friendships

Being Friends with a City-State will let you freely pass through their lands. They'll also aid you by providing a bonus specific to their type. Many Civs may be friends with a CS at once, but only one gets to be considered their Ally and get the best they have to offer. See the list of City-State types below to learn of the specific bonuses.

Alliances

A City-State Alliance provides you double the benefit through the CS bonus itself while the City-State will also give you a copy of each Luxury Resource they own. While you will not get to trade these copies of Luxuries, if they happen to have something that you already have, it will enable you to trade your copy without penalty. The Strategic Resources they provide will do the same - give you room to trade some of yours, while you rely on them to provide the rest.

City-State Allies will also give you their votes in the World Congress, which can ultimately lead you to a Diplomatic Win. Read that guide to learn about the Delegates you get per Era. While they are not particularly helpful in War, they can provide distraction for enemy AI units and will occasionally assist you in combat when the target is nearby. A CS Ally in a choke point can be the ultimate defense in a War, after all it is better if tiles are not being blocked and blood is not being shed on your land.

List of City-State Types in Brave New World and Their Bonuses

There are five types of City-States and all provide a bonus at Friends that is increased when you are Allied. Some City-State bonuses go up in the Medieval and Industrial Eras, although some never change. As I list each bonus by era, I'll list for Friends/Alliances with each CS. Ramkhamhaeng of Siam gets +50% Food, Culture, and Faith from City-State bonuses.

Meeting City-States quickly is a part of the Early game rush. Each City-State you meet first will give you +30 Gold, while meeting them after another Civ gives +15. Religious City-States will give you +8 Faith, and meeting just a couple can result in the founding of a Pantheon for your Civilization.

Cultured City-States

Gives +3/+6 Culture Ancient-Classical Era, +6/+12 Culture Medieval-Renaissance Era, +13/+26 Culture from Industrial to Information Age. The Culture will only help with Social Policies and does not aid with border growth.

Maritime City-States

These Alliances always give the same amount of food, no matter the Era. For Friends, it's +2 Food in the Capital only, helping growth. With an Alliance, this jumps to +3 Food in the Capital and +1 in every other City, providing a boost in Growth to your entire Empire.

Mercantile City-States

Mercantile City-States give +2 Happiness in the Ancient and Classical Era, whether you are Friends or Allies. This bonus increases to +3 in the Medieval Era and beyond.

Militaristic City-States

Friends to a Militaristic City-State will get a Free Unit on average, every 20 Turns. Allies get them every 17 Turns. These Units are typically modern, and may come from any Civilization - so you could end up with some Unique Units from other Civilizations. If your Military is getting too big and the maintenance costs too high, you can talk to a Militaristic City-State and ask them to stop sending you Units until you allow them to resume.

Religious City-States

Religious City-States give +2/+4 Faith in Ancient-Classical Era, +4/+8 in Medieval-Renaissance, and +8/+16 Faith in the Industrial, Modern, and Information Ages. Meeting them for the first time will result in your Civilization getting +8 Faith.

Gaining City-State Influence and Keeping Alliances

City-State Allies provide Bonuses & gifts of Luxury and Strategic Resources

Gold Gifts

Gold Gifts have weakened since Civ 5's first release in favor of Quests. They are still highly effective later in the game, but do give diminishing returns on Influence. Gifts of Gold to City-States can be boosted by taking Patronage Social Policies or even a Religious Reformation Belief that gives +30%. While not as powerful as they once were, Gold-gifts are the go-to late game when you want those Alliances to benefit your people. Early in the game, they'll give the most influence, but you will more than make up for it with abundant gold in the Renaissance Era and later.

Quests

The aforementioned Personalities help dictate what Quests City-States will give. All will give some types - such as finding a certain Resource and connecting it to your Cities, connecting a Trade Route (40 influence) defeating invading Barbarians (12 if within 1 hex of border) and destroying their Encampments (50 influence), taking up your Religion, or building a particular World Wonder or generating a certain type of Great Person. Other Quests are based on City-State type, such as races to produce the most Faith (Religious) or Culture (Cultured) in a set number of turns. Completing Quests is a great way to earn a temporary Ally, but eventually you'll likely need to gift Gold in order to retain the Alliance.

A typical way to gain Influence Early-game is to wait on City-States to start giving out Quests to destroy Barbarian Encampments. You can earn many temporary Alliances that way - simply build a few military units and send them on the attack - you'll get Influence, occasionally get to return Workers and Settlers to CS (getting Influence) or other Civs (getting Diplomatic boosts). Click the crossed swords on the diplomacy panel to see what Encampment they want destroyed. Often, the same Encampment is the target of multiple City-States, and that one should take high priority for you before another Civ clears it.

It's also smart to watch for duplicate Quests - multiple City-States wanting you to do the same thing, such as build the Same Wonder or connect the same Strategic or Luxury Resource. For Example, a few City-States may demand you connect Marble but you have none. Get an Alliance with a City-State that has Marble or trade for Marble with another Civilization to complete the quest and score multiple Alliances at once.

Gifting Units

Gifting Units is typically not that helpful Influence-wise. It takes 3 turns for the Unit to arrive, so by then you have lost 3 Influence to gain 5. Where it really helps is to stop Civs like Genghis Khan and others from attacking City-States or at least slow them down. If you wish to prevent the loss of a CS, you must spread out the Gifts for you'll have to wait on the last to arrive to send another. This is only truly helpful for gaining Influence when a City-State asks for you to gift units through a Quest (they are under attack) or you have taken Freedom's Arsenal of Democracy Tenet, which gives 25 Influence for a gifted Unit as opposed to 5.

Keeping City-State Allies

If you're late in the game and have built up a long list of Allies, occasionally look through your list for those that will soon fall back down to Friends. If you can prevent another Civ taking your Alliance, making you take it back, you should suffer a smaller Diplomacy hit. Gift Gold to City-States whose Alliances are disappearing - suddenly losing multiple Alliances can cause your Civ's happiness to tank, resulting in a loss of growth throughout your Empire. This is especially important to do as you approach Diplomatic Victory, to ensure you have all your Allies when the vote comes up. You can do the math to determine how many turns of Alliance you have left - if you have 75/60 and it's falling at 1/turn that's 15 turns of Alliance remaining - with it falling at 0.75/turn, it'd be 20.

Pledge to Protect

You can go to any City-State window and Pledge to Protect them. Your Influence will rest at +5, meaning in 5 turns it will sit at 5 and be 25 away from Friends. If the CS is bullied for Tribute or attacked, you'll be called by the attacker to either disregard their action and lose 20 influence with the CS or tell them off and take a Diplomatic hit an raise tension between your Civs. For those City-States near you that you want to Ally, pledging to protect is a no-brainer - do it before completing a Quest, and that's 5 more turns you will have them as an Ally/Friend. Since this was dropped with the BNW 2013 Fall Patch, it is primarily used to help actually protect City-States you do not want to be conquered. More often than not, I do it to fulfill a Quest when asked now, as it is often a bother to have to choose between dropping influence and taking a Diplomatic Penalty with the Civ Declaring War on the City-State.

If a City-State is conquered (annexed or puppeted), you can take it back from the attacker and Liberate the City to get your Alliance back. It is easiest if you move fast here, but don't jeopardize your whole empire to save one City-State unless you're sure you can win.

Improve Resource

You can spend 200 Gold to instantly build a Tile Improvement in a City-State's territory to help them connect it. If you're their Ally, you'll get this Resource - otherwise don't do it, as you will not get any Influence for doing so and the Gold would be best spent elsewhere.

Patronage Social Policies

Patronage is the best Policy Tree for Diplomatic Victory because it helps you hold on to these Alliances, along with shared Religion. You'll get a 25% reduction in Influence degradation, more Influence out of Gold Gifts, and 25% of their Science per turn. The doubling of Resources from Cultural Diplomacy means Strategic Resources, but this may also result in some City-States giving you extra resources that don't appear on the map like Porcelain and Jewelry. You are not going to get 2 Gold out of a CS that gave you 1 before, nor will it let you trade it, but the extra resources will go a long way toward boosting Happiness. You will also get +2 extra Happiness per unique Resource that comes from a CS - +X from Other Sources under the list of Resources when you hover over Happiness.

The +20 additional Resting Point for City-States means that any you Pledge to Protect will raise your resting point to 30, or Allies, meaning you could get the basic bonus from every City-State in the game by simply pledging to protect them - don't do any that are subject to attack by an Aggressive Civ as you will take a Diplomatic Hit, but for the most part, these CS will go unassailed and you will enjoy the benefits without having to donate any gold - it is then easy to push into Allies territory with a Gold Gift, later.

Patronage will also cause City-States to occasionally gift you Great People, and these can be of any type - even great Merchants of Venice who can buy City-States to give you control.

Great People Gifts - Sweden

It's worth noting here that Sweden, with its Nobel Prize Bonus, can get +90 Influence for gifting a Great Person to a City-State. No other Civ my gift a Great Person. This guarantees them a 30-turn Alliance. With Patronage maxed, they can gift Great People right back to City-States and easily secure a Diplomatic Victory.

Owning City-States: Austria and Venice

Austria can spend 500 Gold (Standard) to instantly purchase a City-State that has been an Ally for 5 turns with its Diplomatic Marriage special. Venice gets the Merchant of Venice, which can be used to instantly Puppet a City-State (free) and their bonus allows you to purchase in Puppeted Cities. Neither of these options is great for a Diplomatic Victory, but you may secure some Resource or great land you need by using these options.

Demanding City-State Tributes

CS Tribute Factors

When you have a strong military relative to the rest of the World, you may demand tribute from City-States. When you go to the Ask for Tribute interface and hover over the two options, either to demand around 100 Gold (goes up by +5 per Era) or enslave a Worker, you will see how your military compares against their base reluctance of -110. If you can get this number positive, the CS will be considered afraid. With the strongest military in the world, you would have 100 points, so there would still be a gap of -10 preventing them from giving you Tribute. This is where having troops in the area comes into play.

The next factor, and what allows tributes at all, is the combat strength of units within 5 tiles of the City-State itself. Each of the units will factor in; with enough combat power in the area, it will leap in increments of 20. If you don't have enough points, get more units within this range. This will also allow you to demand tribute without having the best military, but by proving your threat by having units capable of attack. When asking for a Worker, you have to overcome an additional -30 to hit -140, and a Civ with a Pledge of Protection gives another -20. Militaristic CS have a bonus of -10. At worst, a Militaristic CS with a Pledge of Protection from another Civ would need you to surpass -170 reluctance (hit +180) to make them afraid. This would mean you'd need one of the best militaries in the world and to put many units near them to accumulate enough points. Thankfully, it's often much easier than this. Demanding tribute of gold or worker is only a really effective strategy early in the game, for the gold grows insignificant and a Worker is something you can buy cheaply.

When you demand tribute, you stop that City-State offering you Quests for a long time. If you have a ton of Influence and a strong military, you may not mind to demand tribute to raise some Gold without costing yourself much - if you expect to be able to replace it in the future. A City-State will then refuse to give you Tribute for a long time, so this system may not be abused. You will not be able to overcome the -300 reluctance until it goes away, presumably in 30-50 turns?

Closing

This should teach you the benefits of City-State Alliances and how you can keep them afloat later in the game. Use the Comments system below to share your strategies for using City-States to your advantage with other players.

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