questions about breaking treaties

[neonext]

shortly after C3C came out, and i read a lot of reviews, i decided to blow the dust off Civ3 and give it another try (with C3C).

my opinion of the game has almost gone from hate to love. there's one thing though that pisses me off every single game (and i dont think it has to do with C3C, which is why i'm posting my question here). at one point or another, the AI's will stop trading luxuries with me because i broke treaties with another AI. after this happened the first couple times, I made sure every game after that to check under Details in the trade advisor screen to make sure i have no treaties with an AI before I declare war. I also made sure I wouldn't lose access to resources I'm trading or money for that matter. i'm declaring war before my troops are in enemy territory, and all other things i learned that damage your reputation. I'm doing all i can think of to prevent my treaties from being broken, but somehow it still happens.

it would be nice if the game would tell you why treaties are broken, but like so many other things, it just leaves you in the dark.

so my questions are:

1) what am i possibly missing that is causing them to not trust me?

2) how long until they start to trust me again?

[bongo]

Haven't played c3c yet(installed it on thursday but haven't got the time to actually play it yet...) but in plain civ3 and PTW you were considered a treaty breaker anytime you did not fulfill your treaties, for whatever reason. One of the most annoying is when trade routes break cause your trading partner declares war with someone and lose his harbors/roads etc. To avoid it, only trade when the routes are not crossing the territory of a third civ and avoid sea trades before navigation.

[neonext]

now that's something i never even considered, but it always happens well past the 1st age when the whole world is explored and everyone has harbors everywhere.

but are you saying that i'll get penalized even if the person i'm trading with losing HIS connection?

what if another AI pillages the spot that has the resource that they are trading to me? the AI that's coming up short with the resource should be the one penalized, just like with the road/harbor/airport thing

[bongo]

If you give horses to one AI civ and the trade link is broken cause the AI civ loose a harbor(or something else that got nothing to do with you) then you gets the penalty.

It doesn't matter who loses the connection, only thing that matter is if you can't deliver the goods you promised.

[neonext]

ugh, you've got to be kidding me! they really need to fix this.

my ships brought the horses over to their port, it just didnt exist anymore! is it my fault they are a bunch of pansies and got all their port cities trampled? it should be either their fault (and their reputation punished), or it should be no one's fault (but i suppose this could be exploited)

how are you supposed to avoid this? not trade to people you know are gunna get wasted soon? a lot can happen in 20 turns....

[sprudl]

Originally posted by neonext
my ships brought the horses over to their port, it just didnt exist anymore! is it my fault they are a bunch of pansies and got all their port cities trampled? it should be either their fault (and their reputation punished), or it should be no one's fault (but i suppose this could be exploited)

Maybe it should be the fault of the attacker. That would be interesting. And it actually makes some sense.

[bongo]

neonext, It has been like this all the time, you don't have to like it(I don't), just learn to live with it. Take into account that 20 turns is a long time and plan for it.

Which means, don't make a deal unless you know it's safe. Your trade-lanes to your partners should be diverse enough that you can experience global war without losing them.

I don't see an easy solution to this. A partly solution would perhaps be to continue trade when trade-lanes open again and 'clear' your record that way. Or allow running deals which could be cancelled on short notice.

[Harovan]

Pre Navigation, you should trade only with your immediate neighbor and only, if you have a land route. A coastal route is too dangerous, because a barbarian galley in the way (coast usually is only 1 tile wide) would already break it. Same with the land route: keep it free from barbarians and from units of civs you are at war with. Don't let them come even close.

[neonext]

thanks for all the advice.

i think i may have found another source in my current game. this probably sounds stupid but lets say i sign a military alliance with Civ A against Civ B and a few turns later i make peace with Civ B. does that cancel the military alliance in a way that makes everyone not trust me?

[Cookie Monster]

Originally posted by neonext
this probably sounds stupid but lets say i sign a military alliance with Civ A against Civ B and a few turns later i make peace with Civ B. does that cancel the military alliance in a way that makes everyone not trust me?

That's a good question and one that I'm interested in finding out the answer. I would assume that yes, you broke the deal with Civ A if you made peace with Civ B before the 20 turn alliance with Civ A expires.

[Thoth]

Breaking a Military Alliance before the 20 turn expiry will make it much tougher to sign future MAs and make them much more expensive. The civ with whoom you broke the MA (ie your former alliance partner) will have it's attitude towards you severely worsened and will likely never sign an MA with you ever again.