Nuclear War

[Cyclotron]

quote: Originally posted by Edward on 01-29-2001 03:46 PM I was under the impression that paying a third country to go to war with someone you have a peace treaty with was a violation of that treaty and worsened your reputation. Is this true?

Not unless they find out

Although you can do this, there is always a high risk (like he said, especially in the modern age) that your victim will find out and an international incident will happen.

You can still take the risk, though...

Perhaps the best way to get the AI to declare war on you is sneak a nuke into a city at peace with you, and hope they catch you! Of course, everyone declares war on you then... But then, maybe that's what you want!

[Gatekeeper]

Everyone:

I have Civ II for the Macintosh and know for a fact that if you have no nuclear weapons — and the AI civilization(s) does/do — you are considered weaker. I base my statement on the fact that AIs who have nukes while you don't typically have a "hostile" or "icy" attitude toward non-nuclear powers. Once you build nukes, though, they "compliment" you for joining the nuclear club and "raise" their attitude to "neutral" and sometimes even higher (think "receptive"). Those powers which continue to not have nukes often become "enthusiastic" or "worshipful" to you, more so if they have no defenses against a nuclear strike.

Regarding using another nation to start a war against someone you don't like, one of the repercussions of being caught includes the collapse of any democratic or republic-based government.

CYBERAmazon

[Barington]

[Originally posted by Blaupanzer
( I know for sure the AI will "nuke hunt," i.e., shoot nukes at your nukes in cities without SDI. If you have a city protected by another city's SDI, that is, within three squares, you can drive the AI nuts by putting a nuke in that city. The AI will burn a ton of shields shooting nukes at that city.)[/quote]

Thanks for that I did not know a nuke added to the attraction of the 'Nuke trap'. I have always just used lots of units; whatever 'rubbish' I have got by bribe usually.

Actually I never usually build any nukes mainly because I have always believed what STYOM above suggests ie that the AI percieve you as more powerful if you have them. With the way I play only using democracy and always being the most powerful my problem is getting them to attack.

Richard
[This message has been edited by Barington (edited January 29, 2001).]

[Barington]

It would seem to be a good idea to have a bad reputation under democracy if you want the AI to declare war but I think there is a double bind here. If your reputation is bad does this not incline the senate to go behind your back and make peace on the next turn? I think this is so but I may be wrong. So you are soon back where you started. Of course they sometimes do this even when you are spotless but much less often (I think).

You can can ask the AI to remove troops when they have not actually got any on your territory. As said above. if you do this often enough they will eventually lose patience and declare war. This seems to work much better if you in fact have lots of military units in there territory. In fact even a one city AI civ will eventually declare war. I think it helps if you occupy all the city squares and 'starve' it into retalliation.

[This message has been edited by Barington (edited January 30, 2001).]

[Stuff2]

quote: Originally posted by Chainsaw on 01-29-2001 03:44 PM Is it necessary to have troops in the enemy`s territory? I can`t ask them to withdraw if they haven`t any troops in MY territory and when I´m in democracy. [This message has been edited by Chainsaw (edited January 29, 2001).]

No, it's not necessary to voilate their territory but it will certainly annoy them more if you do. And yes u can ask them to redraw troops even if they don't have any in your territory. That is if they think that you have a peace treaty.

I have sometimes found that other civs may not always have the same opinion in what kind of relations you have. You can look at your peaceagreement and then when you open the 'embassie-window' of that civ u can see that they think that you only have "contact",
The only thing you can do at this stage is to suggest a new peace-agreement, and hope that they don't "forget" it in the next turn, since you can't ask them to redraw the same turn that the peaceagreement is signed, u must wait to the next turn. I've sometimes experienced that a forign civ simply forgets our peaceagreement every turn. It's annoying but you can then be sure that they will soon attack, so the goal is almost reached anyway.

[East Street Trader]

I agree that the ability to provoke war with the AI while in higher forms of gov.t is an important skill. It is kind of nice that in 18th/19th century Europe there were some diplomatic skirmishes which involved one power or another seeking to find a causus belli. So the game mirrors history a little in this respect as in so much else.

I will add two points. One is that finding your enemy's enemy can help. He will often invite you to join in a war and you can accept with no diplomatic penalty. I sometimes maintain a puppet, one city, state so that when it is in a state of war with other civs I can talk to it, get invited to join the war and happily agree. Using a puppet to gain diplomatic advantage is something you can do more extensively in SMAC but it is quite good value for this particular purpose in Civ2 also.

A second point is that among the things which irritate the AI is to block the movement of its units, particularly settlers. Not sure about blocking caravans in this context.

Edit to add this. Say you have just used your howies to take an A1 city and you wish to knock out a number of the partisans which appeared. You will be able to give instructions to any unit already next to an enemy unit but if you move a unit to get into position ready to attack a screen will immediately open in which the A1 offers a cease fire and the doves will accept. So try to manoevre youe units in advance ready for as much of the mopping up operations to be carried out bedfore you have to move a unit as is possible.

Oh, and another thought. There is definately some pattern to the way the Senate behaves when you have the UN but I haven't yet quite twigged what it is. I don't believe that it is a random dice roll which determines the occasions when I am allowed to continue my "peacekeeping" operations and the occasions I have to desist. Interested to hear the experience of others.
[This message has been edited by East Street Trader (edited January 31, 2001).]

[Barington]

quote: Originally posted by East Street Trader There is definately some pattern to the way the Senate behaves when you have the UN but I haven't yet quite twigged what it is. I don't believe that it is a random dice roll which determines the occasions when I am allowed to continue my "peacekeeping" operations and the occasions I have to desist.

Umm so would I. My only impression is that the senate just gives you x number of chances to keep 'peacekeeping' (means war) going and that x may be inversely proportional to the power of the AI civ. ie the weaker the AI the more chances you get. Just a guess though.

[East Street Trader]

Now you say that, I rather think you're right.

So maybe the UN lets you pick on the little guy but gets worried if it's a more influential power.

ANOTHER good parallel with reality, if true!