Wars and Rumors of Wars

[Skeeve]

Unbelievable! I'm nearly at 1000AD, on a HUGE map with 15 other Civilizations and I have never been at war, nor have I seen any war between other civs!

I've been taking a peaceful trading approach, having carved my niche early in the game. I'm currently the undisputed leader of technology and culture and I'm itching to go to war. However, I'm afraid to do so because I fear plunging this Utopia into it's first ever conflict - Worldwide at that!

Anyone have any similar experiences?
By the way, I've gained a lot of city's peacefully by WOWing them with my culture.

[jbird]

I've had the AI rush me if I was weak, rush an enemy if he was weak, or just be peaceful because they seem to feel like it.

One thing about going to war, if someone has nationalism, you better check your foreign advisor. You *must* be sure to not stumble into a war between you and every other civ on the planet, due to mutual protection pacts. Actually, i've been able to hose the AI with this from time to time, by allying with 2 or 3 other civs, even at some cost, to make sure that I'm not the sole target of any agression (or retaliation for my agression lol).

Jbird

[Kyle]

My last two games, no wars until the Industrial era started.


Heh, right now, all but myself and maybe one other civ are ganging up on the Americans and there are about five alliances against them as well.


Seems like they don't start wars until mutual protection packs are introduced.

[sgrig]

Re: Wars and Rumors of Wars

Originally posted by Skeeve
Unbelievable! I'm nearly at 1000AD, on a HUGE map with 15 other Civilizations and I have never been at war, nor have I seen any war between other civs!

I've been taking a peaceful trading approach, having carved my niche early in the game. I'm currently the undisputed leader of technology and culture and I'm itching to go to war. However, I'm afraid to do so because I fear plunging this Utopia into it's first ever conflict - Worldwide at that!

Anyone have any similar experiences?
By the way, I've gained a lot of city's peacefully by WOWing them with my culture.

I had a VERY similar experience playing on chieftain on a Huge map with 15 other civs. I had my first proper war after 1500 AD !
Between 1000 AD - 1500 AD I took over lots of cities culturally!

So I guess that's a great improvement over Civ2 where whenever you meet a civ you are bound to go to war with it, while in Civ3 you can coexist peacefully for over 5000 year!

Mind you, from about 1600's onwards wars became quite frequent . It was also quite a challenge keeping up with the diplomatic developments in the world as it is indeed quite easy ending up fighting 2 or 3 civs even before mutual defence pacts - military alliances do the job.

In 1650 AD I had 22 cities, with about half captured from other civs (mostly peacefully) - by 1800 AD I had 50 cities - while I built at most 10 new cities in that period, so you can judge that there has been quite a lot of warfare going on!

[vovan]

It seems to me like th AI becomes more aggressive on higher difficulty levels. Subsequently, on something like chieftain there will be less warfare going on than on Deity. Maybe, I'm wrong, though.

[jbird]

*laughs*

Well, i'm playing the Persians just tonight. The Zulus *demand* I give them Monarchy or they'll declare war. I refuse, they follow through and declare war.

This is in *ancient* times. I ask the frenchies to go to war with the Zulus with me (they're actually between myself and the Zulus). They want 40 gold, that's cheap to make their cities the first targets instead of mine. I sit back, thinking that'll be enough to secure my border.

When I end my turn, France gets Germany to join in, and Germany gets the Babalonians to jump in as well. 4 on 1, just because he demanded Monarchy from me.

I did absolutely nothing, as the corruption from any captured cities would have *stunk*. The AI was able to take a total of 5 cities from him before peace was stutteringly re-established.

Regent level, btw. Just another example of the AI being bloodthirsty sometimes.

Jbird

[solo]

On deity, the weaker you become, powerwise, the earlier the AI will come after you, which is usually well before the AD years!

[dexters]

It should be noted the AI doesn't know who is human when its declaring war, and I think this pretty much applies to pretty much all aspects of the game.

[Skeeve]

Thanks for the advice guys

It is now 1380AD and the Greeks have just declared war on me for no apparent reason. However, they are so far away that neither of us can get to each other.

The most interesting thing is that, somehow, they convinced the Indians (a relatively weak neighbor) to join their war against me.
Well, I rolled into the Indian Capital and took it in 2 turns! Then, 2 turns later, I took another one of their cities! Thanks Greeks! Now I finally have an excuse for conquest! Not too smart of India to join in a war for which they would suffer the most damage. Suckers!

Oh, by the by, The Americans have since joined the Greeks and Indians against me, but they are on the other side of the planet. No threat at all.

Well, as Jbird said earlier, sometime the AI's bloodthirstyness works against it.

[Plumbean]

Plumbean

I am playing on a hugh map thier are four players and in 1100ad I was attacked by Americia I was surprised the computer attacked me wave after wave it took every thing I had to hold them off.It seemed they were heading for my capitial city and nothing else.It was like germany in russia i kept giving ground and in the end I swallowed up thier army in the end the computer sued for piece I went for it I had to rebuild my economy but I had so many units I had to get ride off some of them.So far the game seems cool its the first time in a while I had a real good battle with the computer

[SandMonkey]

In my current game the Persians keep doing the stupidest things. They marched 20+ troops right through the middle of my empire (this was after a war in which i took 3 of their cities), and they passed right by my capital! They kept on marching, and eventually I got them kicked out. A couple turns later though, i tried to get them out of my territory again, and they declared war. Great. Now there's 20 guys sitting right outside my main section, and I have very little to beat them with. Well, I was able to whittle them down to 9 left, so far, but with some pretty heavy losses. Also, in the frontier where most of the fighting has taken place, i've gotten my butt kicked pretty badly (mainly due to the fact that the AI somehow mass produces their units with no regard or consequence for their economy, but whatever). Once I finish my road to a supply of iron... they'll feel my wrath through cold steel

[sgrig]

Currently its 1816 AD and I am continually being scared by the Romans - they were at war with Zulus and just had to move about 20 legions through my territory! And when they finished the war they move all their legions back through my territory! Their allies the Egyptians are doing the same but with dozens of knights and chariots - through my territory . I asked them to leave a few times, but they just step into my borders again the next turn! So now I just want them to go back home as quickly as possible, because if they declare war on me I'll have to fight both of them because of mutual protection, which will cost me a few cities!

[Jaybe]

Originally posted by sgrig
... I asked them to leave a few times, but they just step into my borders again the next turn! So now I just want them to go back home as quickly as possible. ...

If you have the units to spare, physically block your borders with units, but leave them a corridor to pass through (if you want). Then the problem is that you would also like to line the corridor with troops also, though it may not be necessary if they are just passing through.

High defense units probably are not necessary. They're just passing through, with no hostile intent (we hope)!

[jbird]

Or, if you're just gonna let 'em go through anyway, sign a right of passage agreement, and they'll be out 3x faster due to your road network. Once my culture had absorbed the open spots in my empire (so the AI won't build a city in them) I'd sign a right of passage with someone that wanted through, to make them less likely to attack me and to get 'em out quicker.

Side bonus: You can freely investigate their land if you haven't traded for thier map.

Jbird

[HunterAssasin]

I hate signing right of passage agreements just for the fact that in the late game you have to watch like a hundred AI units walking through your territory, and if you shut off animate friendly units it's hard to tell if a friend is amassing units near your border to backstab you.