Consulates and tributes

As we all know, Consulates is a powerful policy allowing us to get friendship bonuses with all city states on the map. But there are often warmongers in the world who demand tributes from city states - and if we pledge to all of them, it causes us either to take diplo hit or to revoke protection.

What do you usually do in such a situation? Do you take the diplo hit with the civ to retain bonuses or you prefer to stay on good terms with the civ?

Is the decision of the AI influenced by your military power? Say, if you have three comp bows in the renaissance then AIs will feel free to demand tributes, but if your military is stronger than theirs, they'll refrain from doing so?

But still usually, as a player, you keep small fighting force not to pay so much maintenance.

Let's discuss

I just take the diplomatic hit...it's negligible and there's no point to losing out on the city-state bonuses.

I'd always take the "diplomatic hit"; it has zero impact on trade values no matter how many times that AI brags about bullying your city state.

I always take the diplomacy hit, it's minimal and doesn't stack.

Is it minimal according to game data? It's bright red in the diplomacy screen. Good to know that it doesn't stack.

Yeah I don't think I've ever seen any tangible negative consequences from standing up to any Civ that bullies your CS. Take the neglible diplo hit and carry on like usual.

Consulates plus pledge to protect is pretty much overpowered. It would probably be a reasonable finisher for the Patronage tree, but at two policies it's ridiculously good.

Gort said:

Consulates plus pledge to protect is pretty much overpowered. It would probably be a reasonable finisher for the Patronage tree, but at two policies it's ridiculously good.

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It is extremely powerful indeed especially with all the happiness you cam get from it. That to offset all the food you can get makes for nice capitals. Take the autocracy policy that adds 6 influence to any city state you could demand tribute you can get some ridiculous influence numbers.

Except that it is moderated a bit by taking 20 turns to get there, assuming you are starting at 0.

Buccaneer said:

Except that it is moderated a bit by taking 20 turns to get there, assuming you are starting at 0.

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Greece is awesome with this strategy since it gains influence so fast.

Just pledge to protect right when you meet them.

I've played with Greece before and the near perma-alliance is great.

I agree with what everyone else says: Generally speaking there should be no reason to back down over city states. The dipo hits themselves have practically no baring on your relationship with the A.I. Any change would be due to other factors.

The same is for stealing from city states, the A.I will go through the process of threatening you, but is not really going to change without something more drastic being involved.