Perhaps this can shead some lights on all the anti-warmonger feelings out there

I don't think anybody is completely against the warmonger penalty in as much as they think it should be modified. The point of human players only accepting trading with a stronger player is based on "need" of what the stronger player has to offer; and truthfully that analysis or weighing of need vs augmenting a stronger player is going to happen regardless of the stronger player's warring tendencies. Whereas the AI makes choices based of off a stricter set of rules that doesn't include their need. Hence you get the biting their nose off to spite their face routine (yes some players behave this way as well, but not all or even most I'd guess).

Yes Civ is a win/lose game but it is also played by many as a simulator as well; that is the big immersive factor.

Not sure about the topic of "early conquest expansion is not worthwhile" but it very much is worthwhile, in fact I would say it's the most worthwhile. In the argument of taking a city vs settling a city no it isn't. When you factor in removing a close rival (who tend to become the biggest problems), gaining a second or third city which is another capital (usually very choice real estate), and now being free to settle the surrounding prime real estate without having to worry (as much) about it being settled by someone else, or having to squeeze in a settled city in less than ideal locations; then yes early conquest is very good. Wiping out another Civ in classical (even ancient) times usually leads me to abandoning my games as it's quite clear I'm goin to dominate the game and win however I choose (on emp w/o "cheat" mods - and if memory serves the jump from difficulty 6 to 7 isn't that much outside of "victory is no longer assured at this point")

If fireaxis's goal is to make that early conquest harder, than improve AI tactical/planning/awareness abilities. Make it harder for me to conquer, don't just make the difficulty in choosing to conquer or not.

I don't see changing the honor tree to include penalty reduction. It would be better served in the commerce tree as I'm finding I'm more affected by warring as a peaceful Civ (which is only really done as a situational necessity), at the effect is that it cripples the diplomatic portion of the game (yes it is the chain denouncements that are the real problem, but that is triggered by the WM). As an actual warmongering Civ the penalty hurts me none. I'm too strong militarily and I've tons of resources now with the ability to take what I want instead of trade. The difficulty in warmongering is overextending myself militarily or failing to recover sufficiently from each war. I don't see warmongers needing help in warmongering (unless the map is stacked with war civs in which case, you just rolled a hard map).

The WM penalty has hurt the games it has been meant to help more than it's hurt the games it's meant to affect (actually hurt is the improper word, modify is a better term)
 
Polisurgist said:
That's more or less what I was thinking...or if, instead of "fading in" every diplo adjustment, just have a general sliding scale that starts when you meet a civ in which the impact of everything in total has a diminished, but steadily increasing, effect.

Another symptom of this problem: you can generally trade a luxury to an AI from your first meeting screen for 7 GPT, which is the highest you're ever going to get without special circumstances. I'd generally think they should be a little more cautious of this dude they just met and know nothing about.
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This would work for me, I like the logic of it anyway.
I'd like to see some social policies, ideology tenets or religious beliefs have some effect on warmonger penalties. Crusades, which would diminish your warmonger penalty among civs that share your religion (could be a Founder belief or a Piety policy).
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I like this a lot. For a twist, it could combine an active and a passive effect.

Adopting Piety (or an extra bonus to an early tenet) could boost a bit or give a promotion to the units fighting those of another religion. This should probably last all the game.

Alternatively, the "crusader" traits could be added to a few beliefs, letting some religions but not all become "crusading ones" in any game.

The passive effect would be : Civs that have adopted this Crusading policy (or perhaps opened Piety, or just follow the religion if it's beliefs) will give 50% or more less warmongering penalties for the capture of cities from Civs not following their religion until they discover Scientific theory (50% of the reduction removed) or open rationalism (-50% to the effect also). The capture or conversion of a city from another religion could also give +1 local happiness to all cities following the religion of the attacker for 5 or 10 turns (this could cancel unhappiness from civil resistance during the crusading eras. That too would vanish with Scientific Theory or opening Rationalism). It could also increase/decrease penalties for CS depending on their religious alignement.

This could be cool combined with a new diplo action by which you can ask a friendly civ for a deal in which you pay gpt or faith per turn, or x faith to get a Missionary from their religion, so the player can actively seek an alignement.

Autocracy is ripe for a tenet that makes civs that share your ideology give you less of a penalty...some others.
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I would like that, though I'd even prefer the introduction of "Ideological Summits" working like the WC but with only the ideological partners, in which the two founders of the Ideology alliance would have bonus weight, the rest being determined by relative military and cultural/tourism strengths.

At those summits, you'd have a series of economical/diplomatic/military tenets that can be adopted or repealed. Eg: Free Trade: +x gold per trade route to other civs following your ideology. Open Borders between all civs of the Ideology. Embargo against all Autocrats. Each member could put up a proposal, and there would be a summit every X turn, and a special session every time a new civ joins the Ideology. Autocracy would have a tenet by which it lifts all warmongering penalties for the conquest of non Autocratic cities and unaligned CS. It would have another to increase the penalty for anyone conquering an autocratic city and for liberating a city or former CS belonging to an Autocrat.

Order could have a Satellites tenet that allows the capture of cities from Freedom or Autocracy (and unaligned CS) without penalties from other Order civs.

Freedom could have a tenet by which it gives an extra bonus for the liberation of cities. It could have another by which it lifts the penalties for the taking of cities from a Civ that has declared war on another.

For Order/Freedom, any city razing would void the bonuses and bring the full penalties.

Most of the tenets would be public (announced) but a few would be secret: global defensive/offensive pacts and for e.g. a Collaborative Intelligence tenet by which any tech stolen from the civs of the other Ideologies and any information obtained would be shared between the members. A Freedom tenet could actually ban spying betwen members of the alliance.
 
CultureManiac said:
Since the Honor policy tree is frequently, and probably legitimately criticised as being sub-standard compared to others trees, even for warmongers, then having the policies include a reduction in the warmongering penalty would seem an obvious and easy way to ease both complaints: The excessive warmongering penalties on the higher levels and the need for a boost to the honor tree.
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TheMeInTeam said:
The problem with SPs having an impact on diplo is that it further alienates SP and MP, where players wouldn't care about them the way policies and MP diplo currently functions.
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I thought you had the cure CultureManiac, damn MP players.
 
You COULD just build in better economic incentives in addition to the current honor bonuses, until it becomes a viable trade-off against the other initial options (IE its better than it is economically, but not as good as other options unless you actually kill stuff successfully). Others have pointed out in threads long back why its military aspect can't be buffed too much (honor or die is not a strategically deep opening, and is even less flexible than what we currently have).
 
TheMeInTeam said:
You COULD just build in better economic incentives in addition to the current honor bonuses, until it becomes a viable trade-off against the other initial options (IE its better than it is economically, but not as good as other options unless you actually kill stuff successfully). Others have pointed out in threads long back why its military aspect can't be buffed too much (honor or die is not a strategically deep opening, and is even less flexible than what we currently have).
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Yeah, I was a little perplexed and the lack of attention given to Honor. Maybe they were riding the wave of trimming down the war mongering and didn't want to buff it. Either way, could use a boost.

Still leaves the "I'm not a warmonger, just wanted to cap a few cities" folks out in the cold.
 
I think I understand the intent of the new system, which is to make any attempted Domination victory be built on subtlety and playing public opinion until you're too powerful to stop. That earns more points with me instead of letting a player declare to the world "I'm going to kill EVERY one of you!"

The breakdown seems to be in some specific situations. A few examples spring to mind:

1) You're being forward settled (double points if it's goddamn Pocatello). You MUST clear this land-hogging prick's city out before it eats all your tiles, but because it's their second city... crap.

2) Shaka or Attila are doing that thing they always do, and won't stop until you've brutally beaten them. There can be no peace on 'even' terms, otherwise they'll be back again. You have to totally gut their empire to win all the future wars, too.

3) You're compelled to kill a City-State. Maybe you're Spain, and goddamn Bratislava and Vancouver just swallowed your two nearby Natural Wonders. Or you're Genghis Khan and that's kind of your only advantage until Keshiks.
 
GoStu said:
I think I understand the intent of the new system, which is to make any attempted Domination victory be built on subtlety and playing public opinion until you're too powerful to stop. That earns more points with me instead of letting a player declare to the world "I'm going to kill EVERY one of you!"

The breakdown seems to be in some specific situations. A few examples spring to mind:

1) You're being forward settled (double points if it's goddamn Pocatello). You MUST clear this land-hogging prick's city out before it eats all your tiles, but because it's their second city... crap.

2) Shaka or Attila are doing that thing they always do, and won't stop until you've brutally beaten them. There can be no peace on 'even' terms, otherwise they'll be back again. You have to totally gut their empire to win all the future wars, too.

3) You're compelled to kill a City-State. Maybe you're Spain, and goddamn Bratislava and Vancouver just swallowed your two nearby Natural Wonders. Or you're Genghis Khan and that's kind of your only advantage until Keshiks.
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  1. There are cases where getting forward-settled is a real hindrance, but it's a lot rarer that this is the case over someone just settling in a place where you'd like to have settled, in which case you're just going to war because they have something you want. Even in that case, though, getting over the penalty for taking a single city isn't nearly as hard as some people are making it out to be.
  2. Shaka and Atilla are s, and they're s who attack early. Getting at least one of the 2-3 civs you're likely to know at the time either of them comes knocking to declare war with/before you should not be hard at all. Anything you do before meeting other civs won't matter.
  3. Making the AI cautious when dealing with a player who considers a city-state owning a natural wonder just cause for conquering them is exactly what the warmonger penalty should do. This whole "I'm not warmongering, I just plan on taking everything and anything I want by force" thing is absurd.
 
Polisurgist said:
  1. Shaka and Atilla are s, and they're s who attack early. Getting at least one of the 2-3 civs you're likely to know at the time either of them comes knocking to declare war with/before you should not be hard at all. Anything you do before meeting other civs won't matter.
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umm, more like not possible if you play Pangaea.
Even if I stop scouting to deal with Shaka, the AI will come find me before I can take them out, and getting the AI to declare early war on him is unlikely unless I got lucky with a very rich starting position. I am not going to be able to afford both an army and an early bribe in most games.
 
This whole anti-warmongering mechanic can get surreal sometimes....

Playing as Spain I found a natural wonder after several turns of exploring with my settler. Although I didn't know it at the time Alex was nearby....

Then further exploring revealed a choice Petra site not far away and very close to Athens...I decided to drop a city there anyway....and amazingly managed to build Petra...though it took forever and was a bit of a "nailbiter"..... All the time, though, I was expecting Alex to DOW ..... he never has. I'm at about Turn 240 with four cities and am the dominant civ.... I dominate the World Congress ...have several research agreements going...am well down the Rationalism tree...

Alex is 'way behind...has never built a second city ...only had one CS ally which I eventually bought off....

Yet, amazingly, almost all the other civs have called Alex a "nuisance"....I don't know why... he hasn't done anything....

I've tried all I can to get him to DOW me, but he won't. Now it doesn't matter anymore...Athens, while it would fit in with my empire, has nothing of interest in it.....the penalties just don't seem worth the bother.....

It's been an interesting game, but it has also shown me that I need to have a better understanding of the warmongering mechanic....

And also another mechanic about about buying tiles.... Even though concerning Alex and nearby Napoleon, I have always told them that I'll do what I like when it comes to buying tiles or settling cities, I still get this "It seems you lied" penalty... I don't know why???
 
Koiranputki said:
This whole anti-warmongering mechanic can get surreal sometimes....

Playing as Spain I found a natural wonder after several turns of exploring with my settler. Although I didn't know it at the time Alex was nearby....

Then further exploring revealed a choice Petra site not far away and very close to Athens...I decided to drop a city there anyway....and amazingly managed to build Petra...though it took forever and was a bit of a "nailbiter"..... All the time, though, I was expecting Alex to DOW ..... he never has. I'm at about Turn 240 with four cities and am the dominant civ.... I dominate the World Congress ...have several research agreements going...am well down the Rationalism tree...

Alex is 'way behind...has never built a second city ...only had one CS ally which I eventually bought off....

Yet, amazingly, almost all the other civs have called Alex a "nuisance"....I don't know why... he hasn't done anything....
Click to expand...
All the talk about warmonger penalties here can obscure the fact that there are other things you can do that might make civs like or dislike you. Alex is a jerk, whether he's warring or not, and he might have made some rash denunciations or something against the wrong people.

Koiranputki said:
I've tried all I can to get him to DOW me, but he won't. Now it doesn't matter anymore...Athens, while it would fit in with my empire, has nothing of interest in it.....the penalties just don't seem worth the bother.....

It's been an interesting game, but it has also shown me that I need to have a better understanding of the warmongering mechanic....
Click to expand...
First thing, if you are thinking of taking Athens, know that your penalty won't be affected much by who declared war upon whom. So grab it, if you're interested.

Koiranputki said:
And also another mechanic about about buying tiles.... Even though concerning Alex and nearby Napoleon, I have always told them that I'll do what I like when it comes to buying tiles or settling cities, I still get this "It seems you lied" penalty... I don't know why???
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Did you tell someone you were just passing through when they asked about troops on their borders and then attack them anyway?
 
Koiranputki said:
Yet, amazingly, almost all the other civs have called Alex a "nuisance"....I don't know why... he hasn't done anything....
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Many AI are keen to pick on the most pathetic ones, and as they often get to denounce them, they get hated. They have done nothing, precisely, including performing.

It's got nothing to do with warmonger mechanics.

And also another mechanic about about buying tiles.... Even though concerning Alex and nearby Napoleon, I have always told them that I'll do what I like when it comes to buying tiles or settling cities, I still get this "It seems you lied" penalty... I don't know why???
Click to expand...

There seems to be a bug with some of the promises mechanics since the patch. It's as if the AI gave that one to you by mistake when it should increase its modifier for having repeated an action that angered it. I got a broken promise modifier once for killing a spy.

I don't know if the diplo numbers are also wrong or if it simply displays the wrong modifier, though. It's always happened to me when I angered the AI, but just not for breaking a promise.
 
I think I understand the intent of the new system, which is to make any attempted Domination victory be built on subtlety and playing public opinion until you're too powerful to stop. That earns more points with me instead of letting a player declare to the world "I'm going to kill EVERY one of you!"
Click to expand...

While I can agree somewhat with this sentiment I feel that the way it's achieved seems incredibly immersion breaking. I would basically call it an exploit when the best strategy is to pay one of the ai's to declare war so they take over the same city so you can liberate it. Basically the whole "Now you have to outsmart the A.I." argument seems kind of silly because it's so stupidly easy and breaks down to just paying them.
 
Bulldog Bats said:
Again, another flaw.

Let's say you live in a city involved in an international war. You are going to get conquered. According to the game, as a citizen, you would rather that the winning nation burn everything to the ground and kill everyone, and start their own country, rather than working with the people there to make them feel like a person, and part of the new country. Either way it is a war of conquest.

Sounds like you would prefer to be conquered by the Nazis than the Romans. Again, makes no sense. War does suck, but it happens. Rome at least made the conquered part of their empire - just as legitimate as those in Rome. It is one of the reasons they got so big and lasted so long. If they had not expanded beyond what they could control, they would have lasted even longer.
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Augustus was a smart man and left that in his will. They ignored it later on and Augustus got the lulz and looking down uttered "told you so." :lol:
 
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