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I've noticed in a couple of my games that the premature ending of alliances can have very weird effects.
Example 1:
I was Romans, on Warlord level, in the Middle Ages. 8 Civs, Standard map, continents. Well, I stumbled across the Chinese on an island by themselves. I was friendly with them, gave them a ROP and all that. Later I gave them contact with the other Civs. Later still, they landed an elite swordsman next to one of my cities (without me knowing about it), and then sneak attacked. The swordman was killed, and I then launched my legions against China. I already had a legion and a settler sailing down to build a city in the unclaimed area of the island, and I called up others. Wtih some minor help from the Germans, I was able to conquer the whole of China except Hangchow, then made peace.
Some time later, the Germans declared war on me totally out of the blue. This lost me my source of Dyes, and cut off the flow of Gems from my cities to in China and the other luxuries to China. I was very pissed and got all the Civs that knew of Germany (Egypt, Greece, Aztecs and China) to join me and declare war. The Germans sent about 9 units against Nuremburg, which had defected to me, but that was it. Over the next 20-30 turns I rolled over Germany and took everything except for some cities the Aztecs got.
As soon as Germany was gone, the Chinese became furious with me and suddenly they were at war with me. They didn't even declare it, they just suddenly were. I rolled up at Hangchow with a few more legions and that was that.
Example 2:
I'm Germany, playing on the Imperialism map from Civ 3.com. I started on the central continent, and eventually built a city on the northern one occupied by the Aztecs and Romans. I had a ROP with the Aztecs, but with about 11 turns to go on it they started moving soldiers down around Dortmund (the city on their continent). I wasn't concerned about this until they attacked me and took the city. I then reloaded and tried to stop the war by giving the Aztecs gold per turn. That didn't work, so instead I reloaded again and beefed up the city defense. They still attacked, and would have got the city, but I made a deal with Caesar to attack the Aztecs and his legions killed the guys outside Dortmund.
The war went on for a while, but then the Aztecs suddenly called me up and offered some very generous peace terms (peace + Music theory plus some gold - that was THEM paying). I accepted, but them immediately afterwards Caesar was furious with me and at war. I then signed a military alliance with Montezuma (very oddly, he now went from Furious to Polite), and proceeded to wipe the Romans off the map.
While I was typing all this I realized what was probably why. In both these cases I tied the alliance to a peace treaty. As the alliance disappears when you make peace or destroy the enemy, the peace treay went with it.
Lesson learned: If you intend to end alliances before they end, don't tie them to deals you want to keep (e.g., ROPs, peace treaties, trade deals etc.).
Example 1:
I was Romans, on Warlord level, in the Middle Ages. 8 Civs, Standard map, continents. Well, I stumbled across the Chinese on an island by themselves. I was friendly with them, gave them a ROP and all that. Later I gave them contact with the other Civs. Later still, they landed an elite swordsman next to one of my cities (without me knowing about it), and then sneak attacked. The swordman was killed, and I then launched my legions against China. I already had a legion and a settler sailing down to build a city in the unclaimed area of the island, and I called up others. Wtih some minor help from the Germans, I was able to conquer the whole of China except Hangchow, then made peace.
Some time later, the Germans declared war on me totally out of the blue. This lost me my source of Dyes, and cut off the flow of Gems from my cities to in China and the other luxuries to China. I was very pissed and got all the Civs that knew of Germany (Egypt, Greece, Aztecs and China) to join me and declare war. The Germans sent about 9 units against Nuremburg, which had defected to me, but that was it. Over the next 20-30 turns I rolled over Germany and took everything except for some cities the Aztecs got.
As soon as Germany was gone, the Chinese became furious with me and suddenly they were at war with me. They didn't even declare it, they just suddenly were. I rolled up at Hangchow with a few more legions and that was that.
Example 2:
I'm Germany, playing on the Imperialism map from Civ 3.com. I started on the central continent, and eventually built a city on the northern one occupied by the Aztecs and Romans. I had a ROP with the Aztecs, but with about 11 turns to go on it they started moving soldiers down around Dortmund (the city on their continent). I wasn't concerned about this until they attacked me and took the city. I then reloaded and tried to stop the war by giving the Aztecs gold per turn. That didn't work, so instead I reloaded again and beefed up the city defense. They still attacked, and would have got the city, but I made a deal with Caesar to attack the Aztecs and his legions killed the guys outside Dortmund.
The war went on for a while, but then the Aztecs suddenly called me up and offered some very generous peace terms (peace + Music theory plus some gold - that was THEM paying). I accepted, but them immediately afterwards Caesar was furious with me and at war. I then signed a military alliance with Montezuma (very oddly, he now went from Furious to Polite), and proceeded to wipe the Romans off the map.
While I was typing all this I realized what was probably why. In both these cases I tied the alliance to a peace treaty. As the alliance disappears when you make peace or destroy the enemy, the peace treay went with it.
Lesson learned: If you intend to end alliances before they end, don't tie them to deals you want to keep (e.g., ROPs, peace treaties, trade deals etc.).
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