Warlords vassal state abuse question.

[Veritass]

I just got my Warlords and was breezing through the manual (yes, I know, who reads the manual?). Anyway, I was noting that if I declare war on someone, my vassal state(s) will automatically be at war with them.

I was thinking this might lead to the abuse of some poor vassal state. For example, say I have a continent with me in the west, a state in the middle, and a state in the east. I conquer the state in the middle to where they become a vassal state. Then I can declare war on the state in the east, and the poor vassal state (in the center) will automatically be at war with them as well. Since I assume the AI isn't smart to figure out that I am really the enemy, not the vassal in the middle, the vassal state will be a nice buffer zone that I can attack through, but that the state in the east will have to mow over.

Will any of the city happiness or war weariness factors mitigate this?

[Solver]

The state in the middle will be rather weak, if they capitulated in the first place. You can do that, yes, and yes, it will make you more secure, but ultimately, if your vassal gets his ass kicked, it won't be of benefit to you.

[Andrew1999]

Isn't that kind of the point? Check out Spain in the Napoleonic wars, or Germany's "allies" in WWII. Being a vassal isn't supposed to be fun, unless I've completely misunderstood the concept.

[padillah]

Yeah, but if you take it too far (vassal loses 50% of original size) the vassal will rebel. The logic being "I thought you were going to protect me. I can get killed on my own, thank you."

Tom P.

[Prussia]

And if they revolt, you can just obliterate them.

[MasterDave]

In my first game last night, I had three civs I was beating come to be relatively early in the war (after losing two or three cities) and offer capitulation. They would sometimes offer this before I could get their really big big juicy cities and capitals. I am not sure if this is by design, or if they will nerf capitulation in the future to make it take longer for the AI to roll over.

[yin26]

Remember that civ might be free again at some point, so capitulation a bit early like that makes some sense. Also, having a completely weak vassal has its own problems. Of course, if you are strong enough at the time, you should just take all the cities.

[Prussia]

Yeah, but I can imagine wanting my own vassal just to feel like a world-power "pimp" with my own "*****."