Casus Belli?

Knecht · July 24, 2003, 16:31

Any thoughts or convictions out there about the conditions under which other Civs will declare war?
My impression (and that's all it is) is that other Civs seem to jump me either when I'm poorly defended and thus vulnerable or when I'm getting too strong. In particular, it seems they will often declare war either just before or after I acheive a significant military breakthrough - like getting tanks, for example. I'd also be interested in any wisdom about when other Civs are likely to form military alliances. It is always unpleasant to attack a neighbor only to find oneself fighting everyone on the map. A general discussion about how to keep a handle on warfare would be welcome.

Purple · July 24, 2003, 17:20

I like to declare war, then buy alliances against my opponent, especially alliances with civs that might ally against me! Civs are more likely to join such an alliance after you declare war than before.

GhengisFarb™ · July 24, 2003, 18:34

Its random. Sometimes caused by a random fluttering of electrodes, me thinks.

vmxa1 · July 24, 2003, 18:42

To avoid the gang up, get the alliance first thing.
I like to demand they leave when I see one coming and force them to declare war on my turn, so I can go around and sign up some friends.
It seems to me that the AI must jump on you at some point if you are among the leaders.
It will try to bully you if you are weak and that can lead to wars as well. I am not sure of what the exact circumstances are.

Jaybe · July 24, 2003, 20:54

There is an article at CFC War Academy titled "AI Attitude Exposed." AI attitude has a large bearing on states of war & peace, though they can be intimidated (or not) by the size of your military.

GhengisFarb™ · July 24, 2003, 21:43

But I've seen 1 size 4 city empires declare war on my 24 city empire for no reason whatsoever.

Theseus · July 25, 2003, 00:28

GF, they probably got mad at something you posted.

Kuciwalker · July 25, 2003, 00:32

Yeah, when you aren't looking they go online and browse 'Poly. In fact, that's what the OT forum really is: a bunch of Civ3 AI civs all together in their own forum

Theseus · July 25, 2003, 00:39

"F*cking Arrian... I got stuck with him AGAIN on a small continent, and I couldn't tell anyone about it."

"Jesus CHRIST, Aeson AGAIN!!! I was keeping an eye on Joanie and Cathy, and here he comes out of nowhere from his little ice island... I gotta put a Post-It up about him somewhere."

"Oh, and yeah, what about Mister Perfect Peacenik, that git bastard... you won;t believe just happened to me!!"

Solomwi · July 25, 2003, 01:02

I prefer MPP's to straight alliances, for a couple of reasons. First, an MPP gives you an out if you don't want to fight the entire 20 turns. Making peace doesn't hurt your rep like it does under an alliance. The drawback, of course, is that you're liable to get pulled right back into the war within a turn or two. For this reason, I like to do the absolute maximum amount of damage possible in the limited time I'm involved. That way, my allies can take the war to the enemy, and with most if not all of the fighting on enemy ground, I'm less likely to get pulled back in. A second drawback is that you may wind up fighting enemy #2 when you didn't want to, but that possibility exists under an alliance, as well, just that instead of enemy #2 attacking your ally, he allies with enemy #1. The best feature of the MPP to me, though, is that you can make it in peacetime. Again, it's a calculated gamble, but I usually am planning my next war 50 or so turns in advance at least. If I see a potential need, I'll try to get the allies I want into MPP's about 15 turns before D-Day (T-Turn?), since the enemy won't talk to me for five turns anyway. If my ally doesn't get attacked (or attack) in those 15 turns, it works perfectly. I get those guys in on my side, and as soon as I could have made peace anyway, I can slip out AND cancel my MPP, wiping my hands of this dirty little war once and for all and turning my attention to planning the next war.

I made my MPPs a little late in my latest game (Monarch), in which I attacked Carthage because I was out of techs to trade and was sick of paying their outrageous silk and ivory prices. I signed the Ottomans and Japanese on, as they were the only other two (besides Hannibal and myself) with nukes. War goes well (same one I learned the beauty of a 4xMarine Army taking down an MI fortified in a size 23 city), I take all his luxuries and try to slip out due to WW. The turn order was me, Carthage, Japan, Ottomans. Well, a couple turns later, the Ottomans actually keep a Carthaginian city

. They get attacked, I get a message telling me I've declared war, and Hannibal starts firing ICBM's at Oakland. Six of his eight get zapped, but he hits Oakland and Bayt Ras and I'm fuming. A beautiful thing happened then, though. As I'm sitting there chomping at the bit to repay the favor a hundredfold (almost literally!), I see Japan's ICBM's reduce several cities to size 1 with no defenses through repeated hits. Okay, that's nice, and I've still got some lush targets waiting. Then Osman hits the button. By the time he's done, his last 10 missiles have gone into Leptis Magna, which was already size 1 with no defenses and it hits me... those two just retaliated with their entire arsenals. Carthage has nothing left (only one city over size 2 with any kind of military presence, and it's only a turn away from about 4 of my MA armies and three or four MA divisions of 8 units each.). I am now the sole nuclear power on the globe, with about 16 Tactical Nukes and 70-80 or so ICBM's.

Time to make the entire world bow to my will with no pretenses or feigning equality just to keep some off my back while I take down another.

vmxa1 · July 25, 2003, 01:03

Quote:

Originally posted by GhengisFarb
But I've seen 1 size 4 city empires declare war on my 24 city empire for no reason whatsoever.

Yes this has happened and I believe it is part of the I must do something, even if it wrong logic.
IOW in a late game, the AI is looking at teh options and knows that it can only win by getting some of your land, even if it hopeless.
I have posted this game beofre, but I pplayed a conquest milk run and got down to 2048, had all land, but one city. Massive modern troops and had been at peace. The AI attacked me, but what else could it do?
It was hopeless, but it was the only option.

dojoboy · July 25, 2003, 09:03

Quote:

Originally posted by GhengisFarb
But I've seen 1 size 4 city empires declare war on my 24 city empire for no reason whatsoever.

Much can go into a civs decision to declare war on you, such as their aggression level and government philosophy (they may shun the government type you're running atm). But, most often I believe, civs declare war when a strategic resource is needed and/or when they can no longer pay a gpt deal (declaring war gets them out of the deal). In many ways, the reasons that dictate a human player's decision regarding war also influence the AI.

Cort Haus · July 25, 2003, 09:06

Sometimes they'll declare war to get out of a per-turn deal, especially if they're skint.

Cort Haus · July 25, 2003, 09:07

Hey, dojoboy, you beat me to it by three minutes

dojoboy · July 25, 2003, 09:13

Quote:

Originally posted by Cort Haus
Hey, dojoboy, you beat me to it by three minutes

You shouldn't have gone for that cup of coffee.

athorpel · July 25, 2003, 09:45

If an AI civ starts marching troops through my territory without a ROP, I can only grin in anticipation. As long as my military is ready for it I will make the AI declare war against me. How does one force the AI to declare war you ask? Most of you guys probably already know this but here goes. I go into the diplomacy screen and demand that the AI in question give me a city, repeatedly, as many times as it takes to get them furious with me. Make sure it's a city they won't actually give up. Once they are furious, you then demand that their military units withdraw from your territory and the demand will be met with a declaration of war. Instant war that you didn't start. War weariness accumulates more slowly, international opinion of you doesn't nosedive. Everybody else is still your buddy. The continent is one civ closer to being totally controlled by you. I marvel at the AI when it tries to march units across my territory, especially when it seemingly doesn't have a valid destination. It just wants to go in that direction. Whatever that direction happens to be.

Last Conformist · July 27, 2003, 17:00

I, for one, hate the quasi-automatic declaration of war when you demand that the AI's troops leave. I've crushed a dozen empires for no reasons beyond their unwillingness to leave my turf.

A little more respect, on the AI's part, for superior strength would be most appreciated.

eric2075 · July 27, 2003, 17:36

Back to the topic, it seems the ai players often declare war on me just before a significant military breakthrough too. Many times I have been getting geared up to go to war but the ai attacks just a few turns before I am ready. Of course, this could be selective memory too.

Knecht · July 27, 2003, 19:26

In my current game, the Greeks and their allies, the Babs, declared war right after I got Modern Armor. It's true that I've been glaring covetously across my sourthern border at those Greeks the whole game but I've never (until recently) been in a position to jump them. They were definitely next on my list. Now, both the Greeks and the Babs have Mechanized Infantry (making this a tough fight even with my MA) but no MA. The Greeks have no aluminum and the Babs have one. I'm guessing the Greeks have everything but the Aluminum to get modern armor though I can't be sure (maybe not but they seem to have had time to build beaucoup Mechanized Infantry). Since the Babs have the Aluminum but haven't built any MA, they must not have the tech yet (and they can't share with the Greeks because they have only one, right?) Do AI allies automatically share resources? Are they likely to? I have at this point knocked out the roads to both of the Greek's rubber plantations but the Babs also have 2 rubber and no oil (the Greeks have one oil, soon to be mine). Are they sharing rubber? The Greeks can't be swapping oil cause they only have one. They Babs must be getting their oil from someone else or how else are they building those MI? Anyway, they did declare right after my advance to MA but it looks to me like their primary motivation was a poverty of resources (mainly oil and aluminum).

Cort Haus · July 28, 2003, 08:20

Knecht,

Check the trading/diplo f4 screen. There's a trading tab which shows which civs are trading with each other. Not which particular resource (wld be good, though), but a grey line or no line means they're not trading anything.

Use the investigate city option on a small (cheap) connected city to see if they have the resource. You might have had an idea how close Greece was to MI before the war.

sabrewolf · August 4, 2003, 18:20

Quote:

Originally posted by Last Conformist
I, for one, hate the quasi-automatic declaration of war when you demand that the AI's troops leave. I've crushed a dozen empires for no reasons beyond their unwillingness to leave my turf.

A little more respect, on the AI's part, for superior strength would be most appreciated.

yup. and i really hate the AI trying to cross my empire EVERY SINGLE turn... it's so annoying to have to chase him out again and again... and it really sucks if he happens to have some horsemen just around the corner of my vertually undefended rexing cities

Joe Average · August 8, 2003, 06:33

This was my recent solution to Russian troops galloping across my plains.

I call it "The Great Iroquois Wall." Underneath each Mech Infantry is a fortification. The wall was not designed to repell serious invasions, but to merely solve Russia's sudden desire to walk across my continent to attack the Aztecs (dark green) a thousand miles away (circa 1870.)

Besides, certain pedestrian AI's cannot resist a sneak attack deep inside your heart land.

Joe Average · August 8, 2003, 06:58

Attempting a first-time bitmap attachment here... .

sabrewolf · August 8, 2003, 09:40

i meant more in the early stages when populating. by then you usually havn't got enough units to divert the AI.

Arrian · August 8, 2003, 11:52

I view settler teams trying to move to the other side of my empire as gifts (2 slaves each).

-Arrian

vmxa1 · August 8, 2003, 13:22

Yes settler teams are double bonus. I get to kill a unit and maybe get a leader or a promotion and two free workers.
The AI loses a trooper and a settler. If you tried to walk a spear and a settler across their land, they would not allow it.
Plus I have to be concerned that if I asked them to leave the game will toss them to a better point and closer to their target.

zorbop · August 9, 2003, 21:41

what bothers me is when you ask the ai to leave your territory, and they do, but come back the next turn. OVER AND OVER AGAIN.
on that topic, RoP's should have to do with more than territory... but on who needs to get where and why (mongols need to cross your territory to crush celts)

vmxa1 · August 10, 2003, 00:11

It would be nice if it could be a tad bit more robust, but I suspect that the last thing they want is more code and longer turns.