Obstinate old fool aren't you?

I can't recall ever trying to force Shaka to capitulate before, but in my last game he refused to talk for much longer than 10 turns. After wiping out about half his empire in 8 or so turns I stopped advancing and was just waiting for him to start talking. After he still wasn't talking after 12 or 13 turns I got sick of waiting and continued the march, taking all his cities except for the lame one he build out on an Island. Finally, when he had one unit in his last city he stoped refusing to talk.

I'm just wondering if that is typical Zulu behaviour.

FYI, Playing Prince difficulty, normal speed, on Warlords for Mac, playing as Ragnar. Shaka declared war on me, I think because he'd already planned a war on Isabella, who'd capitulated a few turns before.

Thanks for your input.

btgwynn said:

...Shaka declared war on me...

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That's part of the reason for his stubbornness. Copying from this thread about the refuse to talk length variance:

It's the leaders' RefuseToTalkWarThreshold from the xml (5 DeGaulle ... 12 Sitting Bull) doubled if they DoW'd you and scaled for war success ratio (if you have more than 2* their war success it can be reduced down to 20%). There is no scaling for game speed.
So minimum: You DoW DeGaulle and annihilate his SoD + take cities without losing a single unit --> 1 turn
Maximum: Sitting Bull declares war on you and you aren't winning --> 24 turns.

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Here are the leaders ordered by their RTT (RefuseToTalkWarThreshold):



Shaka's is 10, since he DoW'd you he won't talk for 20 turns unless your war success is much bigger than his (if you completely crush him without losing many units he will talk after 4 turns).

Thanks, that was very useful. Somewhere I'd gotten the impression that it was 10 turns for everyone, but I'd never bothered to dig into the code.

I had the exact same situation with Hatty but it says she has a value of 6?! It was restricted leaders if it matters...

As long as you don't play with "Random Personalities" Hatty should be willing to talk after 6 turns (you DoW'd her) or 12 turns (she DoW'd you) at the latest, earlier if you clearly dominate the war. I'm not sure if you meant unrestricted leaders, but that option does not change the xml attributes for the individual leaders, it only allows all combinations of leaders and civilizations. Random personalities on the other hand might have given you Sitting Bull's xml attributes (including RTT = 12) with Hatty's face and traits.

I DoW'd her, and it taken more than 30 turns to get Hatty talking. Is this value different for other game speeds (I was playing epic)? Does this value apply to vassalizing status?

And yeah, sorry, I was playing unrestiricted leaders.

IIUC there is no scaling for game speed.

Does this value apply to vassalizing status?

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Did she become someone's vassal in between (this would have meant war with this 3rd party too). If so, she was not allowed to enter peace talks until she probably broke free again after 30 turns, because you took enough cities from her.

No, it was only the two of us, we were isolated.

DanF5771 said:

That's part of the reason for his stubbornness. Copying from this thread about the refuse to talk length variance:


Here are the leaders ordered by their RTT (RefuseToTalkWarThreshold):



Shaka's is 10, since he DoW'd you he won't talk for 20 turns unless your war success is much bigger than his (if you completely crush him without losing many units he will talk after 4 turns).

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DanF5711, Great chart. What is the number in the first column and how does it fit into the calculation? Also, is there a guide anywhere on how the AI evaluates "war success."

I take umbrage at the thread title !