how to (ab-)use vassals

convince me
in all my experience with vassals i didn't really get them to use at full efficiency or they were always backstabbing me.


in my first game (settler ) i was far far ahead in tech, when i landed on the second continent and razed a city two civs offered me vassalage. so i figured why not, and took them.
i tried to use one of them as my warmachine, so i gave him most of my techs and some units so that he could help me fight my wars.
but what did the bastard? after 10 turns he revoked his vassalage...

needless to say i nuked him into oblivion
then the global warning started to hit in and i aborted the game, was boring anyway.


the next game i tried it a little bit different.
i brought an enemy to capitulate, donated him all the captured cities back, gave him most of my techs and used him as tech whore.
as he had capitulated he couldn't break free without growing larger or getting decimated by another civ, so i was quite safe.
problem was: he sucked at teching, so most of the time i ended up researching it myself anyway.



so far the only use i found for vassals is for a diplomatic victory, cause they have to vote for you.

anything i am missing about vassals?

I don't have warlords, so I don't know how vassels work, but from my understanding, the first game, the AI saw you as a stronger Civ, so it wanted protection, but as soon as you gave it your Techs, it had an advantage and didn't need your help anymore.

Vassals are good for diplomatic and a little bit helpful for domination victory. But they can be a pain in the ass. In my last game, I took Mehmed as a vassal, because I would have nothing to gain from his three cities he had left after the war. Razing them would strenghten his neighbours. He offered me capitulation, I said yes. After few years Stalin attacked Mehmed and I had to attack him. After that, Hyuana attacked Mehmed and so on. This vassalship ruined my diplomacy...

Soultwister said:

I don't have warlords, so I don't know how vassels work, but from my understanding, the first game, the AI saw you as a stronger Civ, so it wanted protection, but as soon as you gave it your Techs, it had an advantage and didn't need your help anymore.

Click to expand...

i know that now, and am more careful

but still, how can i gain something from a vassal?

i don't understand vassels either, they are meant to bow to your every command, but they ALWAYS refuse to give me their stuff, or change research... and i thought what a waste of time i will just destroy them, but i couldn't even declare war?

As I've said in other threads, I find vassals worse than useless: they just cost you more in city maintenance, which can be a truly horrible thing in the later (conquest) game when you have lots of cities. Not, mind you, that I have had many vassals; after getting one (by capitulation) who wouldn't talk to me and therefore I could make no demands on him and another (voluntary) who was so far behind on techs as to be useless for research and I had no surplus resources to sell him for profit, I have refused all other offers of vassalage - a feature which is sadly in need of re-vamping completely, in my opinion.
A civ who is ready to capitulate should, as things stand, be obliterated. One which seeks your protection must be relatively weak, hence is worthless and, as was mentioned above, a soft target for enemies, which will bring you into war whether you are ready for it or not.

I only take vassels if their remaining city is inconvient for me to go take. An example; I crushed peter of Russia but his last city was on an island somewhere. Since I was on my way to drive into Russia's neighbor India on my next turn, I accepted his offer of capitulation. Freeing me up to invade India and not wasting time looking for his island city.

I have found Vassals to be very helpful and compliant when I was lucky enough to use them correctly. In several games they have been a deciding and determining factor in getting earlier victories.

There are several mitigating factors that need to be in place before I accept their offer to be Vassaled.

One of the best benefits is when the Soon-to-be Master state has an overload of tradable resources and the potential supplicant has access to their ATM machine.

The other benefit I enjoy is using them as buffer areas around my fifedom. After capturing some enemy cities on their outermost edges, I allow them to expand into the new territory and actually protect their infant cities with a unit or two. This allows the fighting of major wars on grounds far removed from the nest-egg of principle cties in the capitol district.

I've even had some great wars in which the principle players did not engage each other at all, but each sides Vassal pounded away at each other along the same lines as US/Israel vs. Iran/Lebannon.

Good stuff.

The only reason I take vassals is when the war has been dragging on too long and my cities are starting to starve from war weariness so I really can't fight anymore, and their remaining cities are somewhere out of the way where I won't regret too much not killing them completely. They don't really help you much in war and they go through and pillage all the improvements around cities you are about to capture, which is also annoying. The only benefit I can see is you can eliminate a rival without all the work of completely destroying them.

Personally i find thatthe worst problem when you accept a vassal is the fact that you have no more control of your diplomacy due to the bug that AI will not consider that going in war with vassal means also go in war with the master.Except for it i'm very happy about vassal implementation they should help you in war (i don't know why but AI vassals are a lot more aggressive then your vassals against other AIs), you can get everytime a tribute of gold from them, you can control what they research, you can ask them their resources, you have access to their territory.Anyway the problem that you are involved in a lot more wars is more than a factor and i have lost a lot of games due to war caused by other AI attacking my vassals.

I've never had the AI attack my vassal, so that's a problem a lot of people mention that I'm not familiar with. That wouldn't bother me too much because I'm usually up for a good war.

If you have a load of spare resources vassals are good for milking money out of, depending on how much land you left them with. The 1+ happiness bonus isn't bad, either.

drkodos said:

I have found Vassals to be very helpful and compliant when I was lucky enough to use them correctly. In several games they have been a deciding and determining factor in getting earlier victories.

There are several mitigating factors that need to be in place before I accept their offer to be Vassaled.

One of the best benefits is when the Soon-to-be Master state has an overload of tradable resources and the potential supplicant has access to their ATM machine.

The other benefit I enjoy is using them as buffer areas around my fifedom. After capturing some enemy cities on their outermost edges, I allow them to expand into the new territory and actually protect their infant cities with a unit or two. This allows the fighting of major wars on grounds far removed from the nest-egg of principle cties in the capitol district.

I've even had some great wars in which the principle players did not engage each other at all, but each sides Vassal pounded away at each other along the same lines as US/Israel vs. Iran/Lebannon.

Good stuff.

Click to expand...

*Claps* Well said. This applies to me. (Monarch Level, Large 14AI Fractals/Terras, Aggresive AI------ Everyone has to play with Aggressive AI, it spices up the game!)

I trade extort them my extra resources for GNP. Can be pretty much.

Do the "We long to rejoin our mother country" unhappy faces dissapear if you make their home country a vassal?