Hmm is this still happening I thought it was fixed maybe...  Well if so that's a real bummer... this is one of the more annoying glitches.

Stardock - pls take a look at fixing this one next patch!

Thanks.

@Willie - if you don't have anything constructive to say then don't fill the forum with garbage, it's really getting a bit tiresome.  Adding a smiley face to your post doesn't make it humorous or any less annoying.  In particular in this case, the post is in in the Support area where we want it taken seriously. 

This is not working as designed, Frogboy stated some time ago that the 5 turn limit was added as the UI level and he hadn't had a chance to apply it to the AI.  There has been no indication from anyone at Stardock that this is how it's supposed to be, ie. to give the AI player an advantage.

Frankly, this is a really annoying issue/bug.  Just search the forums and you'll see it's been pointed out before.  

One of the selling points of FE is an AI that doesn't get to cheat.  The AI being able to insta-raze is cheating.

Personally, I'd like to see raze times dependent on the level of the city, and monsters be unable to raze lvl 2 cities, just lower them a level per turn and destroying buildings.  (one potential exploit would be the 2000 gold level 5 town improvement and being razed, but that's something that probably wouldn't be used)

also,

AI getting insta war from NA pact is something I had. I can't break NA pact, and I don't see THE NUMBER OF TURNS I HAVE LEFT TO be able to declare war.

Please check first (dont know if 1.32 now gives same rules to AI and player)

and please add a number shown to the second.

AL.

Good point about the Monsters/Denizens.  I would like that too.

Realoading is the most powerful spell ever.

I like to watch myself for the urge to reload. It's usually an indication that I did something that I knew I shouldn't (tried to take the easy way out) and got caught like I knew I would. Heh. My rule is that I only allow myself to reload over a specific case of being dumb once.

I think that razing should be the same, human player or computer. That question aside entirely, of course there should be consequences for leaving the rear unattended. If you can't be strong everywhere, it's a much more compelling choice to have to make to choose where you will concentrate and where you will be stretched thin.

I'd rather see your potential opponents strongly incented to attack you where you are weak, rather than just be able to raze a city instantly if a player can not use that same tactic.

I don't get this thing where lately there's a few guys suggesting that reloading a game is somehow cheating...??  Who the heck are they cheating by reloading?  If someone wants to reload a game for whatever reason then that's their call... no-one is playing their game but them.  It's a rather derogatory term that I don't personally think is necessary.

If you look in ElementalDefs.xml, you find this:

<OwnershipTurnsBeforeCanRaze>5</OwnershipTurnsBeforeCanRaze>

So presumably if you did want to try playing with insta-raze... just change this to zero and you're probably good to go.   

I think the key thing is that it should be consistent  i.e. same for AI as it is for the player.  Frogboy all but admitted it was a bug in another thread, this one:

https://forums.elementalgame.com/439893

In fact reading that again now, he actually said "It's on my list.", so hopefully it's still on his list because this one has been complained about quite a bit.

Cheating in the Solitaire is still cheating

However, the temptation is strong and I admit that despite I am quite good at resisting it sometimes (very few times) I find excuses to convince myself is not cheating . I remember a Warhammer 40K PC game (I think it was called "Chaos Gate") that had a difficulty level called "Heroic" and was described like this "You can only have one slot used for that game, and any time that one of your units is killed the game gets saved automatically". I think that option would be cool to be implemented. 

Calling it "changing the rules" is another way of cheating yourself (and that answers the question )

Needs to be fixed. I'd rather see cities blue to be razed immediately by all or have it take time to raze.

This is an interesting idea.

Another idea: When you choose to Raze, the raze happens dynamically to the equation 2xlvl = raze time limit where each turn that goes by reduces the population by current - current*currentlevel/2. (equation may be off). point is that the final turn should result in reducing the population to zero, thus concluding the complete destruction of the city.