How to bully the AI

[The Moose]

I've never been able to bully the AI into giving me something (tech, money, or even a map) even when a huge stack of my army was standing on his last, poorly defended city's doorstep. (AND, I have never even been at war with him........yet ).
I'd like to hear from people who've been able to bully the AI into handing out something....
Cheers

[fittstim]

On of the easiest ways is to take that massive army you have sitting on his doorstep and capture one city. Then hold out a few turns and ask for peace. When you ask for peace, you can almost always (this depends on different factors of course but in general it holds true) get their world map and a large % of their gold (lump sum).

When dealing with money, the AI has a very strange perception. It would NEVER give out "1 gold per turn" (= 20 gold over 20 turns) but instead would gladly give out several thousand gold as a lump sum. Dumb!!!

Also go through all of theÃr cities and see if they are willing to part with any. You can usually get a few size 1 or 2 cities this way.

It also helps to pick on the right civ. India seems to be a pushover while the US would rather be exterminated than give out a single piece of gold. I guess militaristic civs are less likely to give but I'm not 100% positive.

[Jethro83]

I've sometimes been able to collect tribute from an enemy using inferior force purely from being able to capture two or three cities quickly. Though its been quite a rare occurance (usually if I have inferior force I'm lucky to get out of the war without giving THEM something for peace. Even when I do capture a few of their cities).

I never seem to be able to extract GPT until about the late medieval to early Industrial age (since they rarely seem to accumulate gold until they get banks built up). But I always seem to be able to gain all of their gold in a lump sum payment.

I hardly ever seem to extract cities from even the most docile of enemies. And when I do, I have absolutely no use for that city. Even when I have superior forces, have taken half of their empire, beaten the backbone of their army to dust and have my troops positioned outside their core cities ready to attack at a moment's notice, they are still a bunch of insolent dogs.

Bah! Idiotic AI. Something we'll never understand.

[vondrack]

Originally posted by fittstim
When dealing with money, the AI has a very strange perception. It would NEVER give out "1 gold per turn" (= 20 gold over 20 turns) but instead would gladly give out several thousand gold as a lump sum. Dumb!!!

I believe that this has something to do with how the AI checks its funds during negotiations. It may use its current gpt info to determine whether your proposal is acceptable or not. If it is currently running on negative gpt, it may not accept any kind of gpt deal... rather simplistic, but may be the case.

Also, someone else in another thread mentioned that the AI may wish to keep its hands free for possible hostile actions against your civ. If it accepts a 20-turn deal and then decides to declare war, then it is breaking a 20-turn deal, which is considered bad.

Not advocating how it is done, I know it could be done better, just mentioning possible causes for the "strange perception"...

[bongo]

I've seen all different kind of reaction to my demands. Aometimes they are as easily scared as babies, sometimes they are suicidally stubborn. Most of the time though they give a sensible response.

[Dr. A. Cula]

Originally posted by fittstim

When dealing with money, the AI has a very strange perception. It would NEVER give out "1 gold per turn" (= 20 gold over 20 turns) but instead would gladly give out several thousand gold as a lump sum. Dumb!!!

Also go through all of theÃr cities and see if they are willing to part with any. You can usually get a few size 1 or 2 cities this way.

Actually, I (almost) never managed to get a lump sum from the AI. At least, nothing bigger than 50 gold. However, I usually ask (and get) anything from 5 to 20 gold per turn, plus world map, some new tech, if they have any, and the occasional luxury. Of course, in my wars the AI never has more than 50 gold and when I ask for peace, my invading hordes are surrounding their last undefended city. I think they really appreciate it when you show mercy.

[The Moose]

Bully without war

Thanks for the replies. Of course, I've been able to squeeze things out of the AI when negotiating for a peace treaty.
However, I'm interested in knowing whether people have actually bullied stuff (tech, money etc) out of the AI WITHOUT declaring war. I thought I read some threads about that but it never worked for me even when I'm in the position to annihilate the AI in the next round. I just got some cheeky remark from the leader but NEVER anything else......
Is there anybody who managed to get something without declaring war??
Cheers

[bongo]

I will alway experiment to see exactly how far I can push him in negotiatons(one more GPT maybe?) but I have never succeeded in threatening him to give me anything while at peace.

[Cian McGuire]

Re: Gold/Turn

I believe that what vondrack said is correct- or that the solution is somehow related to his conclusion.

I believe that if they don't have a gold/turn gain, they're not going to give you any. You can usually tell when an AI civ is in it's Golden Age, however- they're willing to shell out exorbitant sums for fairly standard techs or maps.

[Mad Bomber]

Put a SOD on their border, and they will probably reconsider, in the US we call it 'saber rattaling'. Iraq was pretty indignant until the UN resolution was passed, but they have apparently caved in to the US demands (for now)

[lateralis]

it seems as though 2 threads on basically the same issue have popped up, but over in the other won, I wrote:

I tried it only to piss-off the AI and try and start a war without having to be the aggressor. I was quite surprised when they gave it to me! I was playing on marla's world map and had started in europe with many close neighbors, 2 of whom I had knocked out by taking the capitol INCREDIBLY early which gave me a huge advantage early (playing on regent). My military, land, and tech ourpaced greece when I demanded tribute. they were in my way too and since I really wanted them to get pissed and declare war, I was kinda bummed when they caved.

Of course I declared war right away anyhow and wiped them up.

try taking a big stack of your guys and putting them within view of the enemy. ie, not within their cultural border, but next to a city that hasn't grown yet. The AI will see you massing up troops and maybe think twice before telling you to go fk yourself. if their millitary is way bigger than yours (your advisor says "compared to them, our millitary is weak") don't even think about it.

lateralis

[metalhead]

As far as contacting an AI and demanding things goes, I find that they only cave when I am trying to provoke them. It's kind of a carry-over strat from Civ2 that sometimes works in Civ3 - demand something of a civ that is less than friendly, and have them be the ones to declare war. It used to work like a charm in Civ2, no matter how inferior the AI Civ was, demanding tribute would force them to declare war. In Civ3, however, I find that the situations that I ask for tribute are when I am next to a lesser civ, and want to wipe them out, but want them to declare war.

Oddly enough, more often than not, and much to my chagrin, they will agree to my demands to stave off invasion. It's almost like they know what I am thinking. Of course, I will run into the occasional stubborn leader (usually Xerxes, that rat ba$****!) who won't give in, but the best way to get free stuff via tribute demands from the AI are in situations where war will benefit you the most, and the AI Civ the least. These situations are hard to quantify, but in general I'd say demanding tribute will work best when you are next to a much smaller, but still viable civ, ie a civ that can keep up with the rest of the world, despite being smaller than most. You will find such civs more on higher levels. One caveat I would give is that if your demands are outrageous, no civ will give in, no matter what the circumstance is. I have successfully demanded upwards of 500 gold, though, so you can still profit from such encounters.

[ChrisiusMaximus]

Yes bullying tactics have worked for me often, Ive found them willing to give gold, maps and techs in varying quantities dependant on the threat level they perceive you to be to them.

Definitely concur with lateralis and metalhead on their posts. Its a tactic I use frequently to get them to start a war, I will even wait for them to attack on my soil so as to get my MPP partners to assist in taking them out

[kgoodrid]

Cities

Does anyone know the actual calculations for cities? Sometimes I have been very successful at gettin the AI to hand over cities. Is there a cutoff point on size? Has anyone ever gotten the AI to hand over a metropolis?

[Zachriel]

Re: Bully without war

Originally posted by The Moose
Thanks for the replies. Of course, I've been able to squeeze things out of the AI when negotiating for a peace treaty.
However, I'm interested in knowing whether people have actually bullied stuff (tech, money etc) out of the AI WITHOUT declaring war.

Renegotiate the peace treaty. They will often be willing to give something if you are strong. The stronger you are perceived to be, the more they'll give.