I don't quit understand this AP thing. Does the AP give you permanent immunity from wars? I've captured it before and never noticed any help.

I bribe 5 techs to an AI to get it to war, next turn that damn vote comes up, and everyone is forced to peace.

I bribe with another 5 techs, same sh!t happens, vote comes up next turn and boom, no more war.

And what really ticks me off the most, is I never even got an option to defy the vote, only a yes or no was given.

Hmm, usually you can defy... and if you aren't a member, it wouldn't make sense to get a meaningless vote at all. Not sure about that.

The Apostolic Palace is a presence that can't be ignored, but I find it often helps me in warmongering. It makes me secure I can do a series of lightning strikes against a superior opponent - I'll capture a few cities, and before my opponents gets a counteroffensive going some sucker will stop the war even if I don't control the AP myself.

Bribing others into the fray and all-out wars of annihilation become more difficult though.

Here are two facts about the AP that are useful to know and I found out in my last game:

1) Whoever controls the AP (if it's an AI) will use it to stop a war even if he started it himself, the minute he believes he's at a disadvantage.

2) By voting "Never!" you can defy the AP. There's a happiness penalty for doing this, -5 happy for "The world considers you a villain!" but it only affects your cities with the AP's religion. All cities without that religion are immune.

Both those came in useful. I started a war against Augustus and was kicking his butt, then he brought in Ethiopia as an ally. Zara had the AP. I made peace with Augustus, grabbed a city from Zara, bribed someone or other in the other hemisphere to declare on him too, and he immediately called for an end to the war with the AP. Since I wasn't ready for full-scale long-term combat with him, I voted yes.

Later, I repeatedly voted Never when I did start a war of conquest against him, when he tried to stop it and also tried to snatch back cities I'd taken from him. I only had two or three cities with that religion in them, so the happiness effect was minimal.

This suggests an interesting strategy especially if you're playing a Spiritual leader. How about this: Start building the AP, and just before you finish it, convert to some dinky religion that you have in only one or two cities. Then when it's finished, convert back. Then no matter who wins the election (probably it won't be you), you're fairly safe.

Would that work, or does the AP shift its religious focus to match the owner's SR?

But you risk to lose to a religious victory,
as you can't defy it.
Best regards,

All these oddities is why I never paid much attention to it. I actually wish the damn thing had never been invented in the game.

Start building the AP, and just before you finish it, convert to some dinky religion that you have in only one or two cities. Then when it's finished, convert back.

that's not really a good idea. you're losing up on 4 hammers per city (6 if you build the cathedral too).

I always build the AP for the production bonus. It's HUGE.

The AP adds additional challenge to the game. Its usually very pesky. Since it is linked to religion it is much more varied in it effects than the UN. I used to think of the AP as just a pain to my romp and stomp methods. However, I recently had a game where its effects were amazingly fortuitous.

I was on a continent with 3 other Buddhist civs and I was Buddhist too. Boudica was my neighbor. As Hatty I was working on a cultural victory, but of course every so often Boudica would declare war on me. I had a fairly small military, but I had enough so that mainly the wars were just a bother. Love that AP, it always stopped things in less than 10 turns so I didn't have to fool with the war (I already had 12 nice cities). Finally, around Rifling, my cultural victory was locked in and I had built up a nice army. B declared war again, but this time, instead of just repelling, I attacked. Picked up Bibracte (its three seafood cut a few more turns of my CV since I had Sids) and again, love that AP, this time it didn't ask for a 'stop war' vote so I was basically able to swallow up the Celts in about 20 turns.

I've had so many bad experiences with the AP that I will probably always remember this one very positive experience.

I don't mind the AP, sure it's annoying at times and I always hate when an AI tries going for a diplomatic victory (though so far none have succeeded), but it adds some nice strategy and interaction in the game. Plus being the leader and having everyone declare war on the heathens is fun. ;)

But if you don't like it, you know you can just turn it off, right? Just go to custom game and uncheck the Diplomatic Victory option... this kills the U.N. as well. No more problems!

It did save my butt on one occassion... it was a terra I had been focusing all my production and military on colonizing the new world, my small home country didn't have much protection. (my neighbors were friends so I didn't feel in danger) But then sure enough Catherine from the other side of the continent marches a big army right to my doorstep, which I can't counter in time.

She marches it in, but two or three turns into the war and right before I would lose my nice border city... the AP vote pops in for peace and everyone votes yes, even Catherine. Of course I use this time to hastily rebuild some semblence of a defensive army, but Catherine takes her troups back home and never bothers me again. :crazyeye:

Must be nice. MOre than often I get shut down because of the Ap.

I've never seen a diplomatic victory by the AI using the AP (I don't play nice with my neighbors so any diplo victory that could happen is very unlikely AND always a fluke).

I do advocate the strategy of the short scale war followed up an AP vote can be quite nice especially when you only want to strike out and take a couple of cities at a time, rebuild, strike out again and so forth.

And what really ticks me off the most, is I never even got an option to defy the vote, only a yes or no was given.

Were you actually in the war? if it was between two other civs, you couldn't defy it.

For the people that don't like the AP because of the risk of diplomatic victory, you can always modify the voting XML to remove that threat.

The diplomatic victory voting threshold is 75 percent (IIRC), but you can modify that up to whatever you want. Modify it to 100 percent and everyone voting must agree to declaring a diplomatic winner, and if you block an AI diplomatic win by simply voting no on the issue.

The same thing works great for UN stuff (diplomatic wins, banning nukes) that you don't want to pass.

It's a nice way to play with the AP and UN features but not play with diplomatic victories.

I just had a rather silly case.

I was building a spaceship, so I didn't want to go to war. De Gualle was destroying Charlemange, and when I mouse over the option 'make peace with...De Gualle' it says "we'd love to, but you'll have to speak to the other side first."

So I, reasonably enough, assumed that Charlemange wanted peace. De Gualle won't do any deals for peace, but I don't want to be left in a bipolar world (everyone else is a vassal) so I select the "stop the war against Charlemange" option when the UN comes around.

And Charlemange, with another votes to make the measure pass (My lot voted for, De Gualle's lot votes Nay and Never!), voted no...

I just had a rather silly case.

I was building a spaceship, so I didn't want to go to war. De Gualle was destroying Charlemange, and when I mouse over the option 'make peace with...De Gualle' it says "we'd love to, but you'll have to speak to the other side first."

So I, reasonably enough, assumed that Charlemange wanted peace. De Gualle won't do any deals for peace, but I don't want to be left in a bipolar world (everyone else is a vassal) so I select the "stop the war against Charlemange" option when the UN comes around.

And Charlemange, with another votes to make the measure pass (My lot voted for, De Gualle's lot votes Nay and Never!), voted no...
"You'll have to speak to the other side first" means that the other side doesn't want peace. De Gaulle couldn't declare peace even if he wanted to, because Charlemagne didn't.