Can Civs lie?

When a Civ denounces someone, can they lie? Sometimes I get denounced and I`m sure i`ve done nothing wrong, not even expanded.

When a Civ tells you someone`s about to attack you, can it lie about that too?

Often I wonder if a Civ is lying to me or to other Civs to get Civs on its side?

If they can lie that`s cool.

Don't listen to anything the AI says, except when they say yes to pay 240g for your cotton.

Those spy-reports hasn't turned out right once yet for me, so I ignore it.

Also, if they say yes to surrender, I think you can believe that too.

"If a man speaks in a forest and there's no woman there to hear him, is he still wrong?"

It's my understanding that when you get intrigue about the plans of an AI civilization to attack someone, those plans are true. However, the computer calculates and recalculates every turn, and the AI can 'change its mind' based on those calculations, so usually the intrigue about a planned attack doesn't come to fruition.

Well i asked Isabella to stop spying on me, she agreed, and spain has stolen 3 more techs after that (my own spy did nothing to stop it, great help)

scheva007 said:

Well i asked Isabella to stop spying on me, she agreed, and spain has stolen 3 more techs after that (my own spy did nothing to stop it, great help)

Click to expand...

If I don't care about my relationship but need a few more turns to get ready for war with a civ, I might say I won't spy on them anymore, send a spy right to their biggest city, and proceed to try to steal another tech.

In this case, they can lie, just like they can lie about being friendly.

However, they never lie about their feelings with DoF or denouements. They never lie about their feelings when they taunt you (and I don't think they can be happy with you and claim they are guarded or hostile), and they can never lie about intrigue.

They can lie about most anything the human can.

The intrigue part of the espionage, in relation to attacks coming against AI or yourself, is broken I'm afraid. I was playing a continents game (as Japan) and was miles ahead technology wise. I met America and China on the new continent and they had not made contact with any other civ on my continent.

2 turns later I was told by the Dutch (my continent) that the US, a civ they had not met, had no idea where they were or even if they existed, was planning a surprise attack against me.

If the Dutch had not made contact with the US on the other continent (and I checked thorougly that there was no shallow water route between the continents) then how could they possibly have any idea they wanted to attack. Also the fact that the US with swordsmen would attack my large army of canons, knights and Samurai; a bare 2 turns after meeting me is ridiculous.

I assume therefore that the game generates these intrigue messages without much basis on the games current strategic situation.

Good points. scheva007 makes the simplist and most compelling point actually. Indeed, the AI can say it isn`t going to spy, but still sometimes does. So at some point it must decide whether to lie or do as it says it will. I guess in that case the Civs can `lie` after all.

Thanks for input, guys, virtual drinks all round.

A lot of times when they denounce you they say something along the lines of, "I'm letting the whole world know how lame you are." It sounds like you're saying, "but I'm not lame, I'm cool! So they must be lying." Am I understanding that right?

If that's the confusion, rest easy. All they're really saying is that in their opinion you're lame, but with confidence. You could call it lying, but that's not the way I'd look at it. It just means they don't like you and they're being completely honest about that.

On the spying I have to agree that they're just unreliable, not dishonest. If you look at the similar reports from your own spies they're the same way. They'll report a planned attack on a new target every 10 turns for half the game. It is revealing about how fickle the AI is though.

They can. One turn they might be lovey-dovey buddy buds, then the turn after that, they'll denounce you, and all the negative modifiers suddenly come to light.

Well I beleve the AI with intrege but nothing else. Pacal lauched a sneak attack on me an Fatty of the Ottomans told me and I would not of won the game if he didn't tell me. (And Pacal and me ganged up on fatty in the early game so IDK why he was acting so frendly plus Pacal and I were all lovey dovey but I guess thats called a backstab.).

Their intrigue saved me and my ally from Atilla's attack!