How to improve relations and/or avoid war?

[Vulcanis]

I've found that Montezuma will declare on you for just about any reason.

I've got a huge continents game going on, somehow I founded the only religion on it(8 civs, 2 spiritual and I'm not spiritual) and got everyone to accept it, so I'm sitting pretty with 45 gold per turn from every civ having hinduism, but monty still declared war on me despite having +9 relations at the time of declaration.

I've found just about any aggressive civ that is next to you will declare war eventually...and Ghandi isn't much better. For such a peaceful real life persona, he sure is tricky to get a hold on what he'll do.

[Hauptman]

Sorry I just have to brag, and this seems a good thread to do it in.... I had a defensive pact with.... Tokagawa.... You know that guy its almost impossible to get even open borders with. I had him in love with me, maybe its because i was playing isabella, I think Toka's got a crush!~

[Shaka II]

Originally posted by Alkis2
I think they both attacked him

Oh!

That's usually game over then. The dreaded double attack or dog pile situation. I think this is the cause for half of the losses in civ, getting attacked when you can least afford it, or worse, getting double attacked. Keeping everyone pleased is part of the road to success, at least until you're strong enough to not have to worry.

[Badtz Maru]

Originally posted by Alkis2
I think they both attacked him

Yeah, it sounds like he was trying to play with a minimal military (which is why he wanted to improve his relations with Washington). You can't really do that in Civ4, if you are weak you WILL be attacked, no matter what. You might be able to pull off a defenseless state if you only have one other civ on your continent, if they have a peaceful ruler, if you are co-religionists, and if you can resist telling them no when they ask for help - it's a lot of 'Ifs' but I've done it - but I also learned you'll need an army when the civs on other continents get Astronomy.

[lordrune]

In my first couple of games, I was focusing too much on economic/religious/etc buildings, but not building nearly enough troops. The AI started pushing me around a bit, especially when I had a big tech lead but my army was undeveloped.
These days, I'm in the habit of checking my power graph (on the score advisor) to make sure that my army is of a decent proportion, compared to the AI. This makes Monty, Genghis, and co a little less likely to feel opportunistic.

[Vynd]

Yes, both Washington and Louis attacked me simultaneously. I ended up winning that war, I guess. They didn't manage to get any of my cities. Probably because Louis was also busy fighting barbarians and capturing half of Saladin's empire. They did ruin most of my improvements.

Several hundred years later Montezuma *did* destroy one of my cities when he surprised me and sailed across the ocean to attack me.

My third war was with Louis again. He was the most powerful civ, my neighbor, and annoyed with me. But so long as I had a defensive pact with Washington he left me alone. Washington declared war on Montezuma, ending the defensive pact. A turn or two later Louis declares war and sends his choppers, stealth bombers, and modern armor across the border. I was pretty impressed with the AI on that one.

If Louis had attacked a turn earlier he would have had me. As it was, he'd just about wiped out the 15 or so Infantry I had stackd in Nanjing before it became my third city to hit 50k culture and win me the game. I like to think that my culture flowed out of the city and melted all of the enemy units ala "Raiders of the Lost Ark."

[Calvin Vu]

As some people have already mentioned, one of the cheapest ways to improve relations and avoid wars is to join the side of your intended "ally" in a war. Sometimes, you have to initiate the war yourself by bribing them into a war and then participate (even tokenly) in it.

The trick is to pick an ally to build up your relationship. What you should look for in an ally is:

- he will not become your biggest tech adversary later and will remain backward even when you give him a lot of techs to go to wars for you.
- he has tons of troops and can give your attacker headache when he declares war.

In that sense, Alexander, Isabella, and Monty make good allies. Louis is pretty good with troops but could be pretty advanced and become a threat later. Napoleon and Tokigawa are nut cases and it's hard just to talk to them at all. Washington/Roosevelts/Gandhi are wimps and don't have any troops to help you out when you need them. Huyana is religious and unless you drink the same Kool-Aid, you can't please him for long.

Therefore, even when Washington is your neighbor, it might be a better choice to go along with Louis. The moment Washington attacks you, you can ask Louis to attack him from the other side (assuming Louis is Washington's neighbor but not yours). That will most assuredly force Washington's to withdraw his troops to deal with the bigger threat.

You should also avoid doing things which might tempt the AIs into attacking. These things include:
- send an unprotected worker to work on a square which should have belonged to the AI civ if it were not for your culture. They will capture your worker and start a war if you do that. It seems to be an affront to their sovereignty and rub the salt into the "close border" tension.

- leave a city very poorly defended even after they have some troops hanging around near the border next to that city. When seeing these troops (which are not escorting a settler or protecting a worker) it's time for you to re-inforce the weakly defended city and discourage them from attacking (it's also time to build more troops, needless to say). You may even have to leave your inner cities undefended to get the quick reinforcement before you manage to build more troops. It's also time to upgrade the troops there if you have the gold and the tech.

[Nacht]

Good post, but...

Originally posted by Calvin Vu
- send an unprotected worker to work on a square which should have belonged to the AI civ if it were not for your culture. They will capture your worker and start a war if you do that. It seems to be an affront to their sovereignty and rub the salt into the "close border" tension.

Is this really true? I've never experienced anything like that.

[Calvin Vu]

That happened to me a few times. Maybe it's because I usually don't have much troops until mid-game so the AIs figure it could get something out of me without any fear of retaliation.

Another thing I notice is that it is easier for me to get attacked if I have some big fat villages/towns near the border. The AIs love to pillage them.

I play at Monarch/Emperor level, BTW. The AIs could be less aggressive at lower level.

[PaganPaulwhisky]

Sorry I just have to brag, and this seems a good thread to do it in.... I had a defensive pact with.... Tokagawa.... You know that guy its almost impossible to get even open borders with. I had him in love with me, maybe its because i was playing isabella, I think Toka's got a crush!~ 

Maybe he is soft on female leaders as this just happened in my current game with Egypt. I've never had him above cautious before, but he has been friendly for about 2000 yrs in this one.

The bastard still won't trade me any techs though .

[Calvin Vu]

Hey, he didn't like my Lizzy at all so I asked the Mongolian and Greek to join force and wiped him out. Maybe he has some kind of fetish for black hair ?

[Aginor]

Originally posted by Hauptman
Sorry I just have to brag, and this seems a good thread to do it in.... I had a defensive pact with.... Tokagawa.... You know that guy its almost impossible to get even open borders with. I had him in love with me, maybe its because i was playing isabella, I think Toka's got a crush!~

Lies, filthy lies...the Shogun is a maniac!

Seriously, congrats on your diplomatic success. How many wars did you fight with him before breaking him to the pact?

[Hauptman]

4 or 5 wars against our mutual heathen enemy Napoleon and his barbaric Christian hordes.

Toka was very agreeable after the first war. Kubli was also in our tripartide, and i refused to join a war against ghandi with him late game and kubli went insta anoyed even though we were freindly for 3000 years.


Oh and this was Monarch too.