Mansa attacked at Pleased (and stay pleased during war)

[Proteus_MST]

Originally posted by Arrian
I attacked and crushed a civ (England) that I was pleased with (and who was pleased with me). I then turned on my other neighbor, who had been pleased with me the whole game, but who had just dropped to cautious (Inca).

Why? They shared my continent, I'm Organized and can thus handle the extra cities, and I had the military advantage. Plus they were two of the most advanced civs... wipe them out and the competition is all the weaker (although it's already a bit of a joke - I got lucky with the overseas civs all being backward: Aztecs alone on an island, Saladin-Isabella-Cyrus together on a continent).

I guess I'm a bastard, eh?

-Arrian

Similar to my current game.

I shared the continent with Elisabeth and we had good relations, even the same state religion.
But then she made the mistake of first demanding to end trade relations with my friends, the japanese and afterwards even demanding tribute from me (England had a larger military at this time but was technologically backwards).
So upon researching all of the necessary techs to build cossacks, I decided to attack her (even though she still was pelased with me) before she would, one day, attack me (and this time maybe with all advantages on her side) and captured all the cities she had on the continent and an neighboring isle I shared with her (which was a rather easy task, as the highest tech she acquired during the end of my invasion was gunpowder [allowing her to build musket men] and so during most of the times my cossacks only faced pikemen and longbowmen as defenders of her cities).

I´m sure, hadn´t I invaded her at this time, she would one day or the other, attacked me unless I had kept a larger military than her during all of the time.

[Enigma_Nova]

So you got a larger military before it became a problem, and used it to great effect!
... But how did you manage to out-tech Lizzie? The AI often does a GP-heavy strategy, and with Phi/Fin I don't see how she could fall behind.

[Proteus_MST]

Originally posted by Enigma_Nova
So you got a larger military before it became a problem, and used it to great effect!
... But how did you manage to out-tech Lizzie? The AI often does a GP-heavy strategy, and with Phi/Fin I don't see how she could fall behind.

I think the main reason for this might be, that I founded 3 religions (Hinduism, Judaism and Islam) whereas she wasn´t able to do this and therefore every city from Lizzy earned me 1 GP or more (as she adopted Judaism as state religion and had most all cities either with Judaism or one/more of my other religions)
I also had maybe 60% of the continent and, playing as catherine of russia (giving me the financial trait, too) therefore I wasn´t at a disadvantage there (I evenn had a slight advantage as due to my creative trait my borders steadily expanded towards her cities, giving me more "Lebensraum" whereas her realm went smaller and smaller ) and had built the pyramids (whereas Lizzy wasn´t able to complete a single wonder) giving me 3 beakers per specialist with representative democracy.

Another thing was, that at the beginning we were isolated from all other civilizations (see Screenshot below which was taken after Lizzy was already eleminated and the whole map was known to me). The continent Lizzy and myself shared was separated by several ocean tiles from a larger continent, where all of the other civilizations could be found, so, at the time when we made contact to the other civilizations they were already busy trading techs among themselves, so Lizzy probably didn´t get a chance to trade techs with the other AIs, as she was already too backwards at this time and all of her techs were already known to the other AI leaders.

Most of the other AI leaders where at roughly the same level as myself (with me possessing some techs not known to the other leaders and the other leaders possessing some techs I hadn´t researched yet) therefore it would´ve been much harder to start an invasion on any of the other civs at this time.

[Enigma_Nova]

Hope you're not having trouble supporting that empire.
Did you gift Tokugawa those islands to cripple him or did he settle those of his own dumb free will?

[Proteus_MST]

Originally posted by Enigma_Nova
Hope you're not having trouble supporting that empire.
Did you gift Tokugawa those islands to cripple him or did he settle those of his own dumb free will?

Yep, all of the islands were settled by the AI leaders themselves (it seems as if late in the game, when there are no better spots to settle they will settle all remaining free spots available, even if it is just a tiny 1-2 tile island )

As for the financial side:
Nope, I haven´t got any problems supporting the cities. Had to turn the science slider down to maybe 60% during the time of invasion, but I was able to get him to 90% again (and make 100 Gold/turn surplus) after the cultural borders of the conquered cities grew and the cities could work all of the tiles again.
Lizzy was very good at developing the country, therefore my workers hadn´t much to do after the conquest of England

It is as some people say, additional cities might cost you gold for maintenance, but if they´re good developed (as conquered cities usually are) the commercial gain more than offsets the costs for the additional cities (especially if you have the financial trait, giving you a bonus of one Gold for every worked tile that already earns 2 Gold )

(it also helps that I have the monopoly on some of the resources and therefore many trade treaties running, trading the resources for gold/turn)

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

OK I see two possibilities. One is that someone he is CLOSER to asked him to declare war on you which-though it may not seem fair to you-at least makes sense. On the bright side, BECAUSE he is still pleased with you, he ought to be easy to bring back into the fold (thus leaving another civ WAAAAY out of pocket for little gain !)

Another possibility is that it is completely random, which is unfair, but merely proves that the AI still needs a bit of tweaking (but, be honest, even if this IS an anomoly, it is still a HECK of a lot better than in Civ3!)

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

[Enigma_Nova]

How did you end up being a King if you're a lurker? :???:

[Shogun Gunner]

Originally posted by Enigma_Nova
I disagree. Manipulation is the bomb.

If you like a fancy jig saw puzzle - which once you figure out the relationships, you just mindly apply the same dumb logic each time, then you can have it.

I would rather the AI attempt to approximate human behavior -- even if it's imperfect.

[Enigma_Nova]

Yeah, Jigsaw puzzles are too repeditive.
Why don't we design a Crazy 3-D Jigsaw Puzzle? =D

[Shaka II]

Manipulation in the Machiavellian sense is a huge part of the game. Of course, the AI gets to do it too. By the time Civ IV comes out, we'll all be complaining that we were so used, so manipulated by the AI.

Surprises are good for the game. I like to surprise the AI, and usually not in a good way.

I think it works the way it is. We can't expect even a pleased AI not to attack, if you have a very small army. Maybe there should be a military advisor to point this out like in past Civ games? Like "Pssst, I would build my military up if I were you. Look at the size of Catherine's army, and she's got Kossacks".

[Volstag]

I think this shouldn't happen. What's the point to keep the AI pleased/happy if they attack you anyway ?

When they're pleased/friendly, etc, they're less inclined to attack you.

Btw, a question that bothers me for a while: how does the AI know that your military is weak?!?

By checking your relative "power" and examining the "stats" page? As the player you can use the same method to ballpark the size and strength of AI forces.

[Volstag]

But, yeah, what's the point of good relations if the AI is just going to ignore them?

But, as mentioned, the player isn't beholden to "good relations" so why should the AI? Secondly, the game would lose a lot of luster if the player didn't have to worry about AI that was pleased/friendly. Further, if a pleased/friendly relationship prevented hostility, the AI would have no means of preventing cultural assimilation.

And, finally, positive relations reduce the likelyhood of overt hostility. I don't have numbers to back this claim up, but based upon my experience it seems to hold true.

[Shaka II]

Originally posted by Volstag
And, finally, positive relations reduce the likelyhood of overt hostility. I don't have numbers to back this claim up, but based upon my experience it seems to hold true.

They certainly do. To really push one's luck, try having a weak military, and letting your neighbors fall into the annoyed category. It won't take long before he/she attacks, regardless of personality type.

[Shogun Gunner]

I mean something a little bit different -- I'm talking about learning how the AI operates. For example, in Civ3, if you saw an AI settler heading out to plant a new city, you could block it's path, forcing it to move away, then move your unit, which would prompt the AI to send the settler back on it's original course. You could repeat this indefinetly tying up the AI's settler the whole time.

I don't want to "formulize" my actions in a civ game so it because a dull exercise of following little manipulation tricks and well worn strategies leading to similar outcomes each time. The AI declaring war when it is pleased suggests to me that you can't just throw money, goods and kind words to the AI and guarantee their behavior. That gets a big from me.

[LordShiva]

Besides, I declare war on AIs who I like all the time, why shouldn't the AI do the same?