What is the deal with military alliances? And negative modifiers?

[danaphanous]

Okay,

so I'm playing Prince level on Civ 5. Just started Civ 5 a few weeks ago but I have some past experience and am doing pretty well.

Playing as Byzantine and dominating in religion and science, but let's back up. I'm getting negative modifiers and wars with the civs on my island for essentially no reason as far as I can tell. If there is a reason it isn't as straightforward as civ 5 I'm realizing.

So, this game I had already decided--after realizing how slow expansion is in Civ 5 from my last game--to back up and focus on expansion and a really good, smaller empire rather than my huge default. In fact, I was gonna play it peaceful. Unfortunately, I had the (bad luck? of starting on an island full of the worst warmongers I've ever seen. First person I met was Japan which actually was the best of the lot--he never declared war on me, just hated me for no reason and denounced me all the time. The only thing I ever did to him was ask him not to settle near me because he insisted on sending settlers all the way over to me and past my border defense even though he had plenty of spots near him. (He slipped through the 1-tile gap in my borders and wanted to colonize my little peninsula too). He refused, so I diverted military units and workers and blocked him from proceeding and he left. I quickly bought the last tile and sealed him out. Ever since that point he hated me, which makes no sense to me. Are the AI's possibly sophisticated enough to know that I purposefully blocked his route into my territory? Maybe he was just bitter because I was doing well and he was systematically being destroyed by the rampaging Iroquois which declared war on another player every 20 turns or so.

First Hiawatha attacked Japan. Then he made peace after 2 cities. Then attacked again and left him with 1 city. Then attacked Germany (my third on the continent). Hiawatha was the first guy I was legitimately scared of in a game. He somehow had managed to have more cities, more military, more faith, and more culture which is usually my thing. and even though he only had like 2 luxury types he never seemed to have a problem with happiness. (do they cheat?) seriously...regardless, I knew it was only a matter of time before he came for me as I was a close contender in points on the continent and had only managed to do so by skimping on my military and focusing on faith/culture. I had a powerful faith as the Byzantines with excess spreading power and cheaper purchases. Was producing prophets like crazy. But despite his warmongering ways he legitimately seemed to like me. We regularly traded luxuries (mostly because I wanted to placate him). I accepted the 1 threat he gave me for gold when I was getting wealthy and kept it low after that. I built walls and defenses and completed the great wall in preparation--always on the watch for the invevitable invasion as he'd backstabbed everyone on the continent that was doing well and owned almost 2/3 of it. I've never seen an AI fight so well. Though I didn't want to fight the Iroquois insisted I join them against germany and I delayed for 10 turns before entering just to keep them happy. All the while saving military for my own protection and carefully not helping all that much. I only bombarded 1 trireme that was coming up into my territory. I made peace as soon as I could and Germany was immediately polite again. I think he understood I didn't really want to fight him. Nevertheless, true to form the Iroquois turned on me in about 20-30 turns. Suddenly he was denouncing me for apparently no reason and clustering forces near the border. The only thing I can think of is that there is a negative modifier sometimes for spreading religion? I had thought there wasn't from civ 4 but maybe it's changed? I had a few great prophets that I sent down to garner more faith as I get some sweet bonuses for cities under my faith. He complained after a few conversions and I agreed to stop and went into germany's territory instead. Didn't help, in about 2 turns he told me I was a scoundrel and attacked me anyway after denouncing me a few turns earlier. Do they really hate religion that much? I've spread it before with no negative effects but a few ppl, mainly ppl with other founded religions seemed to really hate it which surprised me. I always stopped when they asked. Right before the war they sent their own great prophets to convert some cities that were exerting a lot of pressure on theirs. I told them to stop and converted them right back as I had way more prophets then him--the one thing I was winning at at this point was shear amount of faith income. I had like 88 with just 8 cities or so. He immediately attacked me and converted the "offending" city right back with a prophet.

This is where things went downhill for him. His movement was crippled because of my great wall bonus and my walls were impermeable. I slaughtered about 20 of his units and was killing 3-4 a turn until he finally withdrew from the fray. Knowing he'd be back and not wanting to sit and wait for the next wave I sent a preemptive strike north to his puppeted Japanese cities. This is where my trebuchets and galleases came in handy. I love using boats to swoop in and weaken cities. Mainly beacause with the great lighthouse they'd take the abuse and move out of range without dying when weakened. After crushing a weaker wave that came to protect I quickly mowed through 3 cities. I'm quite good at the rolling-type war I just hadn't wanted to play that way this game. This whole time I'd tried to get Germany to join me. I asked every turn until he started telling me we'd been over this before and he'd never help me. This seemed odd as by the end the Iroquois were severely weakened by me and I knew he had a grudge against them as well. My ships showed empty cities near Germany I was draining Hiawatha's reserves so much. But no, he refused to work with me. I had hoped to use the war as a way of forging a friendship with germany as everyone else hated me for no fault of my own but he moved to cautious anyway just like everyone else even though the war wasn't my fault and I was just defending myself. I was even nice to the Iroquois and made peace after conquering the puppeted cities. Asking for the one with Ivory as tribute and quickly made a defensive line to prevent this crap from ever happening again. About this time Germany declared war on Iroquois (of course) but did it without me and took back the cities he'd lost plus 2 leaving the Iroquois crippled. I lot more than I'd done. Despite this he still was cautious toward me and wouldn't have anything to do with me.

Do they hate you just for winning? Even if you didn't start a war? I'm used to the rules of Civ IV and as far as I could tell there if you don't start the ware and don't wipe anyone out then you don't get negs. I seemed to get tons of negs for no reason. I never did anything aggressive. Never attacked without being attacked but my entire continent refused to work with me and everyone denounced me.

Needless to say. Years later when I was the only one in the Industrial revolution and winning handily the rest of the world was friendly and they were still mad at me. Like their pointless grudges not only happened but apparently would never end. No matter how much trading I did with them. Is there any way to tell why they feel the way they do? It was about at this point where I started colonizing a southern area of the continent that the other two had still not settled. (not sure why...maybe they were having happiness problems after all...) It only took a few turns before Germany decided this was the perfect opportunity to take the colonies even though he'd had like 200 turns to settle the area himself and I'd never done anything to him either and if I had it had been years literally. I had expected this however after seeing the crap that all the other 2 warlike cultures on my continent had been pulling and had a knight, caravel, and 2 frigates for bombardment defense. He only had pikeman, knights, and crossbowmen. I guess all he considered were numbers or he's just a terrible tactician. Regardless I systematically exterminated everything with the frigates (their bombard is great!) and killed about a steady stream of units that tried to enter until he finally gave up. Meanwhile I quickly captured his one close city up north with my cannons. He really didn't have a chance even with my small military. At this point I started asking for peace thinking he'd realize he couldn't compete. To help him decide I had a fleet of frigates sailing around his coast killing everything that moved. But no...he refused to consider peace and Hiawatha refused to join me and get some free cities as well even though it would've been easy for him. His 2 cities ended up having a massive complement. I know because after a few turns of asking for his aid he instead attacked me. So I took his northmost city and started asking him for peace (I really didn't want to wipe the kid out as I knew I'd get negs with my overseas friends if I did). But no...he refused to consider peace to the bitter end. Even when I slaughtered everything and had his capitals defenses reduced to nothing. All he'd say was: nah, we're not ready to consider that. My empire was becoming very unhappy and I wanted to end the war so I finished him. Just as I thought half my friends overseas became cautious despite the fact that I'd tried everything in my power to end the war quickly without finishing him. Germany still refused peace as well despite the loss of a second city and unhappiness was really becoming a problem...so I went all out and just moved tons of Gatling guns, cavalry, and frigates in weakening him in multiple places until he saw the light. I didn't even want to take those cities though I could've. My unhappiness was reaching record levels from this ridiculous war.

So that just ended and now I'm stuck with 25 unhappiness (rebel-level) even after puppeting everything. I bought a lot of gold overseas and acquired a few and hurried courthouses but for whatever reason this did not lower the unhappiness in either city I tried. At the end it was the same as when it had been puppeted even though the puppet number went down? This seemed odd...is this a glitch?

Also, why the heck is this game so ridiculous. Apparently I'm doing something that angers a lot of civs on my continent but I can't put my finger on it. What causes negs and what could I have been doing this whole time to make them so mad? It seems ridiculous to me that I would have never started a war and now own 3/4 of the continent just through trying to end wars? It's not like I was even trying to play conquest but it turned into that because it was the only way they'd be convinced to stop attacking me and end their stupid fruitless wars. And why the heck would none of them ever join me in military alliances? It was obviously in their favor but they wouldn't even consider. And asking seemed to make them despise me as both time they later declared war on me instead even though they were only cautious. Are warlike cultures always this irrational and I just got a bad mix on my continent or did I do something that I don't know about that angers them? Or are some ppl just mad that you're winning? I'd really like to know as I'd prefer to play peacefully next time. I'm sick of this unhappiness, but I feel if I hadn't taken the cities they wouldn't have ever made peace and would have just attacked me again later...

thanks, Any expert advice? I am new to Civ 5 but apparently I'm not bad at winning just unsure how to handle this unhappiness. I checked: I have every luxury in existence through extensive trading including the 2 mercantile ones. I also get +12 from mercantile city state allies and +10 from wonders. I've gotten all the happy ones. I also stuck the 2 happy buildings plus stone works and circus where I could build them everywhere except my latest colonies and the puppet cities. There are only 3 of the puppet cities. My unhappiness is still +23 even after hurring 2 courthouses and 2 colloseums and it seems to randomly jump up despite all my effort. The only thing I haven't done is focus on happiness from religion (which would've been nice) and in civics thinking owning all the luxuries and building the 2 buildings everywhere would be enough. As far as I can tell I have colloseums everywhere except for 2-3 cities and theaters in all but 5 so there's really not much more I can build. Does this mean I'm permanently in the hole? I'm working toward the mercantile bonus in the civics that increases happiness per luxury as I figured this would give me the best payoff but it is taking freaking forever. I also did the piety tree but seem to get no happiness bonus from temples and shrines like other players here said they do.

This is super long-winded but I'm really scratching my head here. As far as I can tell from the mechanics, right now I can only make 7 population cities happy with buildings and with an empire my size every luxury in the world apparently isn't enough. Should I just start burning or is there another way to get things back on track? thanks...any thoughts on

1. Illogical warlike AI's and buggy neg modifiers
2. happiness
3. military alliances (why does everyone say no?)
4. Why will some civs never make peace until death forcing me to end them and suffer the penalty that brings?

 

[danaphanous]

Oh, and this is terribly long. I wanted to express the whole situation as the whole thing seemed like an odd game to me. Not that I mind...it's been one of my most challenging games yet and it's fun to come out on top of those. Right now I'm significantly more than double the score of any other player and am about 2/3 of an age ahead of everyone in science so I'm definately winning. I hate considering this but I could just focus on gold only and hurry happiness buildings everywhere. I don't think I can do more than 3-4 more buildings though as the populations in my colonies aren't high enough to support any more. And yet I still have 23 unhappiness--I think it actually seems to be mostly from my capital region as I have several over 10 and my capital is 20. However, I'd think the wonders they've produced (18) up to this point would've offset. Adding up by hand I can't see any reason why my happiness should be unbalanced and taking specialists off doesn't help either. I've literally tried everything short of civics which I can't get until the next culture tier like 15 turns away.

Seems for every building I build my colonies grow like crazy and it just stays where it is. Has anyone else seen this? I could imagine it being this bad if I had neglected luxuries or buildings but adding them up I have most of the ones I can get looking at population with the exception of the 3-4 sites I noticed earlier...mostly in fast-growing colonies which seem to just grow again and raise unhappiness immediately.

 

[Strategist83]

Sorry, that's way too long. Can't you just sum it up in a few words? There are lots of problems with the AI and how it handles diplomatic relations so if that's what you're running into you aren't the first.

 

[redwings1340]

Hmm, sounds like a game where you're surrounded by children who want to pretend they can kill you. I read through most of it, and yeah, there are times when the AI is irrational. I'm guessing they just want your land. While Japan probably doesn't realize you specifically blocked them, they do realize that their prime expansion spot is in your land. They want that land, and you're in the way.

One thing that does happen is that taking cities by force earns you a lot of diplo hate. Even if you're at war with another player, try to get cities through peace deals or just fight defensively if you aren't out to conquer someone. I think the AI is programmed not to give peace terms for at least about 10 turns after you declare war on them, so if you conquered them too quickly, that may be why they weren't willing to negotiate.

Other reasons though that they might not like you:
1) you've built a ton of wonders. When you build wonders, they covet your wonders.
2) You're next to a ton of warmongers who seem to be in warmongey mode. A lot of this isn't your fault, and sometimes games like this happen.
3) What version is this on? In G+K the AIs will hate you a lot. In BNW there are more positive diplo modifiers.
4) If you spread religion to another civ who has founded their own religion, yeah, that's a huge penalty. If you spread your religion to a civ who hasn't founded one of their own though, that can be a diplo benefit. Considering it's pretty easy to change your cities back to your own religion, I would avoid spreading your religion to competing religious civs directly, and try to work on everyone else.
5) Did you declare friendship with anyone who may be hated on by others? If you did, that could be a big part of this. If anyone else is an agreed upon hated jerk, denouncing them usually gets you diplo brownie points. Unfortunately, that makes it very hard for the agreed upon hated jerk to get any friends, which is some ways is kind of realistic, but it can make playing that guy really annoying. If there's another guy who is hated though, you can try denouncing that guy. It might help you in the eyes of some AIs and start you back on the path to being somewhat liked.

Ways to get happiness
1) Your empire is really large. If you have a really huge conquered empire it's going to generate a lot of unhappiness. I think you're doing ok on that, just keep prioritizing happiness and stop expanding while you're getting this under control. If you ally city states though, you not only get the mercantile happiness bonus, but you also get a copy of any lux resource they have. Therefore, if you haven't done so yet, look over city states and try to ally the ones that have copies of lux resources you don't have yet. If any AIs don't absolutely hate you, you can try trading for their luxuries you don't have too, although that's going to be difficult if they are hostile.

 

[darden]

by and large, I can't maintain the same size of an empire in Civ 5 as I could in Civ 4.

in C4, I'd have half the globe conquered and no happiness problems to speak of... in C5, I very rarely expand to more than 5-6 cities (usually 3-4 cities of my own, and puppeted capital cities of other civs)

 

[danaphanous]

yeah, sorry for the length bro. If you need a summary the 4 points I include at the end are what I was most confused about.

Darden: yes, I am beginning to realize this. I only have maybe 1/5 or 1/6 of the landmass which still seems small to me from my Civ III and Civ IV games but maybe that's unsustainable. Most of it is legitimately mine too as I don't like maintaining puppets and the main unhappiness modifier is population. It's pushing 160 right now. Also, ever since I entered the industrial age my population penalty seems to have skyrocketed. I'm pretty sure it didn't used to be like this, but unhappiness is 1-to-1 with population now. Every time it increases I lose a point which means building buildings is almost pointless as it only makes cities' happiness net-0 even if I hit it exactly. If they get above 5 and don't have stone or horses it becomes a net-negative happiness city and digs into my reserves.

redwings: thanks! Most of that I didn't know. That's probably why I was hated on my continent then--I had 3-4 high production cities and since I was ahead in science I've been getting all the wonders since the medieval era. And even though I didn't wipe out the Iroquois initially I did take 3 cities by force which they probably remember. Could this be why they were unwilling to do military alliances? I thought that was based on your trustworthiness which is high--I've never broken my word--but if it also is influenced by their mood they seem to just want me to die.

As far as luxuries I've done all I can. I have all of them plus jewelry and porcelain, and am already getting a net +12 happiness from mercantile states. I'm working toward the shipping civ bonus which bumps the happiness benefit per type up to +6 but it's still a ways off and civics have been coming a lot slower since my second tier. Next time I should probably invest in some happiness civics early I guess or incorporate it into my religion. Can I alter a religion with a great prophet or is it in stone now?

 

[danaphanous]

And most of the AI's over seas are still my friends. 3 are still big allies with open borders. the other 3 are now cautious and less interested. I've invested a lot of time in making friends overseas to secure all the luxury types already but it's frustrating that this defensive war is affecting that.

And I totally didn't know that spreading religion to ones with a founded religion would dock me points. I've been doing that a lot on my continent actually. Oops!

And it is G+K, I don't have BNW.

 

[redwings1340]

It's still very possible to conquer a lot in civ V, and I don't want you to get the idea that conquering stuff is a bad idea: it isn't! I've generally found it best though to usually conquer in stages, to conquer a little, try to take cities through peace deals, and then have a peace stage where you build up your infrastructure and happiness while preparing for the next war. Then again, I'm not very good at war, so I don't know too much about how to do it effectively.

And yeah, spreading religion to civs with their own religion is probably why everyone hated you on your continent. The wonder modifier (and city state modifier, civs don't like it when you ally city states they are thinking of possibly allying someday) is there, but it's pretty small overall. The religion modifier can be enough to declare war.

As for military alliances, try bribing AIs to declare war instead of just asking them. It doesn't always work, but it will sometimes. As long as the AI you're bribing has a decent military and doesn't like the other computer, the cost usually isn't too significant to this. If the computer is at war with someone else, they will be less likely to go to war with you too, and you get a traded recently modifier.

 

[danaphanous]

Oh okay. I usually just asked what would make the deal work and everyone said no way. Of course the ppl I asked back then were either:

1. not on good terms with me either
or
2. they were far away on the other continent

Are they less likely if they're far away? Wasn't the case before but it might be with the new civ...I dunno. I always assumed they'd be more likely to go to war if they were warlike and liked me, not if they disliked the other culture...but I guess that makes sense too.

 

[Walter R]

I play on Prince and King, and I'd say that at this level you can definitely own the globe if you want to. Another poster said about stage-wise conquest/expansion and I totally agree with that, as it gives you time to consolidate. You never mentioned razing any cities? Razing the poor ones (and a lot of them are) gives you a short term happiness tank but it goes fairly quickly. I'm sure that conquerors and expansionists always have issues with happiness but it can be managed OK (I rarely get more than a few turn blip now but I used to struggle like hell) - my advice would be to plan ahead and boost your happiness before expansion/conquest wherever possible, as it's easier than trying to get back to happy afterwards when your production sucks. I play G&K (so I'm not sure what the BNW policy trees look like) but another must for me is opening Order; also I hardly annex at all because I want the social policies that give happiness, and in any case the puppet cities don't grow so fast because they are too busy building markets and banks to build aqueducts etc. I never played Civ4 so I don't know how it compares.