AI jumps on the war bandwagon

[MrFrodo]

In my current game with Regent/Pangea/Huge/16 Civs I ran
into a funny situation. The map is like an upside down U. I
control the lower left leg. My biggest rival, Russia, has the
top middle. In between us there is Rome, Germany and France
in nice layers. I learned Tank first, so I mobilized for war,
made a Mutual Protection Pact with Russia and attacked Rome.
Of course, Russia was forced to join my war, but they also made
Military Alliances with Greece to attack Rome and Greece made them with Persia and so on. So within 2 turns there were 6 Civs
at war with poor Rome. I was there first and captured or Razed
all but 2 of Romes cities before the other Civs got there and
finished them off.

I have tons of Tanks, so I declared war on Germany. Within 2 turns the same thing happens, all the Civs
decide Germany is about to get whooped, so they jump on the
bandwagon and declare war too. Some declare war without and
alliance, just out of the blue.

So it looks like any Civ I attack, there will be a flood of copycats
trying to get some of the spoils of my war machine. It actually
makes sense in a sick way, but makes it way too easy for me.
One thing about it is that France will bring out all their offensive
units to fight Germany. Once they are in the open I will
blow them all away in one round with ease, leaving them
helpless. Then I will get to Russia and see how their Cossacks
match up against Tanks. :tank:

 

[Sparrowhawk]

The best is when you pay a civ to ally with you, and then they go out and spend their money to get more allies.

 

[markv]

Well... keep in mind it works in reverse! In my last game I was the 'Rome' in MrFrodo's narrative, only a lot bigger and a lot stronger. It still hurt having six civs gunning for me, though.

 

[Cromag]

I loaded up an old close to victory save last night and threw all my nukes at the Egyptians. I expected the remaining civs to come after me but to my suprise they both declared war on the Egyptians. I thought the Germans joining was especially funny, only 2 cities for the last 1000 years and they jumped right on the war bandwagon. I probaly shouldn't have been suprised by them though. They issued ultimatums and declared war on me twice in those 1000 years, even at a hopeless disadvantage.

 

[Moulton]

In a game I have parked temporarily-- it had an unrecoverable error -- France declared war on me, and I asked Greece and Rome to ally with me... they were both happy to do so, for the low price of one luxury each... lux I couldnt sell anyway... noone could afford them. Ten France got Persia and Zulu to declare war on me, and India declared war on Persia. Next turn China issued an ultimatum, and jumped in on her own.. against me....
It could get real interesting, real fast.... and since most of my forces are arrayed against France, to the north, I guess I will have to leave the french spoils to Rome and Greece, and go play games in Zululand

 

[FenrysWulf]

It's not really that they are jumping on the bandwagon, it's the World War I syndrome. If a lot of civs have mutual protection pacts, then when one goes to war there is a domino effect. Let's say you're allied with Germany, and you declare war on Russia. Well, maybe Germany was allied with France, and as soon as Russia attacks Germany, France gets pulled in. France was allied with Greece, so as soon as Russia attacks France, Greece gets pulled in, and so on. This is why the whole world goes to war. It does work the other way though. You attack a civ with three cities and end up at war with the world because that civ had a lot of allies.

 

[Greadius]

I still harbor guilt about this...
Early in my Babylonian campaign the Chinese made demands... I never gave in so they declared war on me. I bought Persian allies, who were a buffer state between me & China. The China buys India against Persia... and then Russia against Persia... and then half the rest of the world. Persia gets wiped from the map, while I quietly settle with China.
It was so wrong... I never even stood up for them.

 

[Moulton]

I have seen the MPP's cause general world war when they kick in. But in my current game we are a long way from nationalism. We have alliances built/bought after the war started, and some just jumped in on one side or the other withoiut an alliance being signed.

 

[DagorFunk]

I love MPPs. In a recent game I was doing fairly poorly so I decided I needed a war to catch up. It was either the Germans or the English who would be my targets but the Germans had an MPP with the French so I didn't want to risk it. So I prepare for war with the English, but knowing I'm not as strong as them I realize I need some allies so I approach France. France's asking price is way to high, but I do note that they have an MPP with tiny Iroquois. So, off I go and negotiate a MPP with the Iroquois and I get some gold in return. Well, off I go to war, take a few English cities. Then, when they counterattack the whole world turns against them. This could have backfired but fortunately I was able to take most of Englands land before the other civs really got into it. I also vaulted from eighth to fourth in the process and ended up winning by space race in 1800AD.

(this was on Monarch, using the Russians, continents, large, 14 civs)

 

[Fanny Brice]

The AI civs definately smell blood in the water.

In one of my first games (before I knew what I was doing ), I had at least 6 civs coming after me on a Pangea map. It was early in the game, so MPPs were not a factor. They were sending units to walk from the other side of the world to attack my puny civilization. I barely had contact with them, yet they would walk through the territory of 3 other civs to crush me.

Lesson learned was weakness attracts unwanted attention. The AI will definately pile on and try to get a piece of the spoils.

The great thing is to be able to manipulate the situation. My current game had me (Germans), the Aztecs, and the Egyptians on one large continent... all about equal size, but me much weaker. Egypt declares war on me and I get the Aztecs to fight with me. I sign peace treaty with Egypt at first opportunity and watch as the two fight along a narrow corridor for years... much longer than I expected.

The Aztecs were eventually wiped out later in the game. But not before they declared war after war on all the other civs from their last city on an island off the coast. What's up with these "runt" states? You'd think they would want to hide.

 

[Mgubgub]

Speaking of the AI and it's apparent bloodthirst/stupidity...

Is it just me or does the AI not take into account it's military/civ size at times? I had issued ultimatums to Egypt and England to get the hell outta my country or else, and they both declared war on me. This is about 30 turns after I had reduced them both to 5 cities or less, while I had about 60+ and was the only civ to have Modern Armor as well. So they send in they knights and cavalry to their obvious ends, and I counter with a couple quick finishing blows to end the English and reduce the Egyptians to the one city they managed to build on a different continent.

I don't get it heh. Is it too hard for the AI to do the math? CivA has 20 times the amount of cities we do, they also have military units at least 2 techs over our best... do we stop invading their territory/leave when asked or declare a certain loss war? DUH.

Kinda funny that I don't like big wars, but made the mistake of going into wartime production when England first attacked me so I had no choice but to crank out a ton of Tanks/Mech. Inf and upgraded the tanks as soon as I could after finding some aluminum. I couldn't get any warring civ to talk to me for about 30 turns after the English declared war on me and drug 3 other allies into it as well.

Anyone know any tips on getting a civ to at least be willing to talk so that you can end a war when needed? I had guessed that as the situation became obviously hopeless they would cave in and talk to me but that didn't work, so I tried not attacking them for about 5 turns and still nothing... Finally one of their allies talked to me and we signed a peace treaty which let me get back to my normal builder mode.