WHEOOHRN - working as planned or exploit?

I installed the BUG mod recently and have been enjoying it, but I've felt a bit guilty about taking advantage of the indicator that shows when an AI is planning war.

For those not in the know (I had to look up what WHEOOHRN not too long ago), if you ask an AI to go to war, his response will be "We have enough on our hands right now" if he is currently planning to go to war with someone. The BUG mod checks that every turn and puts a symbol next to their name if that comes up.

Now, I question whether the designers really intended for it to be that easy to tell an AI was planning war. I understand that they wanted a response that was distinct from either "We don't like you enough" or "They are our friends", but since there are only two other reasons they won't go to war for the right price, being at war or planning a war, by process of elimination diplomacy is really giving more information than is realistic - especially when this reason overrides other reasons - an AI that would otherwise not go to war with someone else only because they don't like you enough, will instead give you the WHEOOHRN if you ask them when they are planning a war. It stands to reason that, in real life, if a civilization asked someone they were not friends with to go to war, they wouldn't tell them they were planning a war with someone else if (ESPECIALLY if the person asking was the person they were declaring on).

Essentially, it looks like an oversight on the part of the developers to have the WHEOOHRN response override all other denial reasons, and illogical to have it available as a tool of diplomacy to the player. This wasn't that big of an issue when you had to ask the civilization in the diplomacy screen (as few people would want to check all civs every turn), but now that it's possible to have that checked every turn automatically, and so we have a warning indicator whenever a civ is planning war.

This is illogical. I think the only time that a civilization should give that kind of reason for refusing to go to war would be if they are on very friendly terms with the person who is asking, and never give it if they are planning war on the person asking.

Possible workarounds? I think the best idea would have the civilization only refuse with a given reason if the reason is "They are our friends", "We don't like you enough", or "We are already at war". That's all the info the player needs and is not unreasonable for a civilization to give that kind of explanation. If the reason is that they are planning war, then they should act as if they are wililng, but no offer that the player makes is enough for them to do it, or maybe have them set a really high price that would be unlikely to be paid and would be worth the change of plans for the AI if they player actually paid it, e.g. captitulation, cities, etc.

Another would be to have the AI never give a reason. This is not unrealistic, but it does make it more complicated for newer players who don't know the game well enough to know what level of friendliness you need with a specific civ to get them to declare war.

I'm sorry, I meant to post this in the General Discussion forum, could someone move it?

@Badtz Maru
it's very easily done... but heck the developers considered to be nice

I'm not really sure what you're getting at. If you're problem is that you don't need to check for WHEOOHRN mode every turn, then you can disable it from the BUG options menu.

And I don't believe that it always means that they are planning. Iirc, some mentionned that they could also give you that message if they were pursuing a cultural victory. I think that there was a discussion of this in Lord Parkin's ALC.

Edit: just checked the thread and it seemed that my memory failed me concerning wheoohrn mode. It's strictly a war planning mode, but I do recommend that people read the 2nd last page where Rolo provides a detailed summary of it.

dirtyparrot said:

I'm not really sure what you're getting at. If you're problem is that you don't need to check for WHEOOHRN mode every turn, then you can disable it from the BUG options menu.

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No, the main concern is that WHEOOHRN is there in the first place. The fact that it can be checked automatically just makes it worse.

WHEOORN just makes no sense, diplomatically. Why would a foreign nation that is not your friend tell you that they are planning to go to war in the future, ESPECIALLY if they are planning to go to war with you? It doesn't seem like something that would be intentionally added, I think it's an oversight because of how the diplomacy screen has specific reasons for all the other reasons and it was not intended to be used as a warning.

It's not necessary to gameplay. The same information could be gathered more realistically by watching the power graph and troop movements of another nation. This would make scouting more useful as well as being more realistic and fair - the AI does not have access to the player's war plans.

Badtz Maru said:

No, the main concern is that WHEOOHRN is there in the first place. The fact that it can be checked automatically just makes it worse.

WHEOORN just makes no sense, diplomatically. Why would a foreign nation that is not your friend tell you that they are planning to go to war in the future, ESPECIALLY if they are planning to go to war with you? It doesn't seem like something that would be intentionally added, I think it's an oversight because of how the diplomacy screen has specific reasons for all the other reasons and it was not intended to be used as a warning.

It's not necessary to gameplay. The same information could be gathered more realistically by watching the power graph and troop movements of another nation. This would make scouting more useful as well as being more realistic and fair - the AI does not have access to the player's war plans.

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Is it REALLY implausible that a civ using careful diligence can't get at least minimal warning of an invasion? I don't see how WHEOOHRN is a bigger problem than turning trees into metal or people or bringing siege weapons to the front line to duke it out.

BUG finally reduces the tedium of this. Any time you have open borders you can see forces massing up anyway...in fact that even gives a clearer picture on the true target.

The OP is suggesting that in CvTeamAI.cpp, this block
... be moved to the bottom of the function.

After DENIAL_POWER_THEM, DENIAL_NO_GAIN, DENIAL_ATTITUDE, DENIAL_ATTITUDE_THEM, and DENIAL_JOKING.

TheMeInTeam said:

Is it REALLY implausible that a civ using careful diligence can't get at least minimal warning of an invasion? I don't see how WHEOOHRN is a bigger problem than turning trees into metal or people or bringing siege weapons to the front line to duke it out.

BUG finally reduces the tedium of this. Any time you have open borders you can see forces massing up anyway...in fact that even gives a clearer picture on the true target.

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It IS really implausible that a civilization that is planning to invade another civilization would TELL that civilization it was planning to go to war when asked.

I wouldn't like it but it would probably be a good thing since it would make me scout the AI's exact units :/. That's usually too much work unless I'm being pretty serious though.

Badtz Maru said:

It IS really implausible that a civilization that is planning to invade another civilization would TELL that civilization it was planning to go to war when asked.

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Sorry, you must be DENIAL_JOKING.

TheMeInTeam said:

Is it REALLY implausible that a civ using careful diligence can't get at least minimal warning of an invasion?

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As you said yourself "you can see forces massing up" and this is what you should have to do using spies, sentries and espionage.

I don't see how WHEOOHRN is a bigger problem than turning trees into metal or people or bringing siege weapons to the front line to duke it out.

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Both humans and AIs turn trees into metal, this has to do with AI behavior which is a completely different thing. And do we really want to make AI even worse in terms of war than it already is?

BUG makes WHEOOHRN way to powerful. If it didn't override the other reasons it would be a nice improvent of the AI.

Imagine this scenario. There are three civilizations in the world - A, B, and C. A and B are at war. B asks C if they will go to war with A. C responds "We won't because we are planning on going to war with someone else soon".

In what world does that make sense? C is only hurting himself, letting B know that he is going to have to fight another civilization soon, giving him time to perhaps make peace with A and build up his defenses.

I know it's a game, but there is no reason to have an AI tell the player it's planning on going to war.

I'll have to check when I get home, but I think the BUG interface actually gives you more info than you can get without it, because I'm pretty sure I've seen the WHEOORN warning on civilizations that I cannot ask to go to war (e.g. not talking to me). I would have no way of getting that info without BUG.

Badtz Maru said:

I'll have to check when I get home, but I think the BUG interface actually gives you more info than you can get without it, because I'm pretty sure I've seen the WHEOORN warning on civilizations that I cannot ask to go to war (e.g. not talking to me). I would have no way of getting that info without BUG.

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Ya, BUG doesn't seem to care if they're willing to talk, it also tells you when civs that refuse to talk (or have forced embargos) are willing to trade or open borders, although only the WHEOOHRN really helps the player.

DaveMcW's solution sounds pretty ideal. Personally, i'd consider it revenge for them knowing of every trade i've ever made, even before i met them.

Badtz Maru said:

Imagine this scenario. There are three civilizations in the world - A, B, and C. A and B are at war. B asks C if they will go to war with A. C responds "We won't because we are planning on going to war with someone else soon".

In what world does that make sense? C is only hurting himself, letting B know that he is going to have to fight another civilization soon, giving him time to perhaps make peace with A and build up his defenses.

I know it's a game, but there is no reason to have an AI tell the player it's planning on going to war.

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I wonder, would Civ C respond like that even if Civ C were planning to go to war with Civ A? Maybe Civ C really is going to go to war with Civ A anyways, but it just can't be bribed into doing so, in which case, you still can't tell whether Civ C is going to go to war with Civ A or B just because Civ C refused to be bribed into war with Civ A.

That is, does an AI warplan against a target open up the possibility that the AI can be bribed only against that target, or can the AI not be bribed away in any way from its original warplan once in that mode? If it were the opposite case, if you could bribe an AI to jump in ahead of its original planning against its war target, you could check the diplo screen of a WHEOOHRN AI and find if they are willing to go to war with anyone. If they are willing to go to war with one civ, but not another, then you've deduced the WHEOOHRN target right there.

So my guess is that this is not how it works, and that you cannot bribe an AI into any war once they are in WHEOOHRN mode, even if you try to bribe them into war agains their planned war target. But then this is also kinda silly, is it not? It's like saying, Germany is planning to invade Poland, but then I'm the USSR and I try to bribe Germany into invading Poland with gobs of money, and Germany refuses, and the next turn Germany invades Poland anyways...

All of these silly conundrums would be removed if, as the OP suggested, the WHEOOHRN response was not always associated with war in the AI programming. I agree with this for the reasons above.

Badtz Maru said:

It IS really implausible that a civilization that is planning to invade another civilization would TELL that civilization it was planning to go to war when asked.

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It's not really that difficult to tell if a country is planning for war or not in real life, so why should it be in the game? Along with an arms buildup, there would be propaganda being spread around to get the people ready for upcoming hostilities. Plus there'd a distinct change of attitude within government circles that would indicate something was up, like increasing secrecy within the military bureacracy, increased rhetoric to paint the upcoming enemy as some sort of demon. In fact, what's more implausible in the game is that you have no clue who the prospective target is going to be. That would be quite clear in reality.

Keep in mind that the information you get about a civ doesn't necessarily come from them directly. It's implied that you have a staff that's working within the other civ's organization, like an embassy and observers who are gathering information for you. If they were the least bit competant in real life, then they would easily be able to inform you about a civ's future military intentions, so the same should apply in the game.

naterator said:

Ya, BUG doesn't seem to care if they're willing to talk, it also tells you when civs that refuse to talk (or have forced embargos) are willing to trade or open borders, although only the WHEOOHRN really helps the player.

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This makes the BUG indicator even worse. The original issue appears to be an oversight of the developers on designing AI responses to war requests, I'm sure they did not mean to allow you to tell if an AI was planning a war, but that's what it does. BUG exploits this design flaw, and also allows you access to the information in instances where it is not available in the modded game. In this, it's not unlike a wallhack in a FPS - in an FPS game, the information about who is hiding behind a wall is actually in the game code but not available to the player, but there may occasionally be clipping glitches that allow you to see through a wall, and if you are using these glitches you are exploiting, but it's not the same as if you download a program that allows you to see through the wall all the time, and even in situations where the glitch would not normally work.

Darnit, I've been pretty glad about my ability to move up in difficulty level, but since I've been using the equivalent of a cheat program it doesn't mean as much.

Willem said:

It's not really that difficult to tell if a country is planning for war or not in real life, so why should it be in the game? Along with an arms buildup, there would be propaganda being spread around to get the people ready for upcoming hostilities. Plus there'd a distinct change of attitude within government circles that would indicate something was up, like increasing secrecy within the military bureacracy, increased rhetoric to paint the upcoming enemy as some sort of demon. In fact, what's more implausible in the game is that you have no clue who the prospective target is going to be. That would be quite clear in reality.

Keep in mind that the information you get about a civ doesn't necessarily come from them directly. It's implied that you have a staff that's working within the other civ's organization, like an embassy and observers who are gathering information for you. If they were the least bit competant in real life, then they would easily be able to inform you about a civ's future military intentions, so the same should apply in the game.

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Nation's in the real world have been surprised by sudden war declarations by nations they have diplomatic relations with. Iraq was surprised by the USA attacking after the invasion of Kuwait despite discussing their intentions with US diplomatic personnel. The Russian invasion of Georgia caught a lot of people off guard as well. The Germans surprised a lot of people in WWII. Usually, you figure out someone is going to war not through how the nation responds to diplomatic discussions, but by observing their troop movements and war preparations, and that method works well in Civ as well (before I had BUG or knew about WHEOOHRN I was often able to guess that someone was about to declare based on this info).

The thing is, there are cases where war can be anticipated by obvious increasing hostility between nations, and that also works in Civ without WHEOOHRN. There are also cases where a nation will suddenly turn on an ally and attack them shortly after they had friendly relations - it's possible to make a trade deal or open borders agreement with another nation, and then declare war on them the next turn at Pleased or even Friendly, and the AI does this all the time. It's part of the game to have backstabbing AIs make surprise attacks on each other, but WHEOOHRN makes it so they can't do that to the player, but the player can do it to the AI. WHEOORN gives the player an advantage over the AI that was probably unintentional, and the BUG mod increases this advantage even further.

I agree with the sentiment OP

I like what Badtz Maru has to say. You cant deny the game would be a little more exciting and have a slightly higher chance of surprise if you couldnt tell when the Ai was going to war. And if you guys dont think thats real then thats fine but you gotta admit it would be more fun.