Beaking vassals away from masters - how?

[jeffreyac]

Hi all,

Did the script to break vassals away from their controlling empires get changed somehow? My current game, I had a huge lead, and got annoyed with an empire over spies (seriously, I need a diplomatic option that says "If you keep messing with me with spies, I WILL CRUSH YOU!!")

Anyway, I decide a quick war is in order to teach a lesson, and absolutely destroy the "master" civ - as in, he's last in the points standings, with very little land/power available. His "vassal" is now about twice his size, and significantly higher in score - and yet is still vassal. I had thought that if a vassal ended up either losing more than half their territory or ended up larger than the master empire, they'd cease being a vassal - is this no longer true?

If this is true, how do you break vassals away from their masters? (I ask, because I want the civs to capitulate to me, and they wont when they have or are vassals...)

If this isn't true, what's wrong with my civ game that it won't break vassal agreements for the AI?

 

[el toro loco]

i wish i knew the answer to this question. i just got done playing a huge islands game. i'm crushing sitting bull and his two vassals. no matter what i do sitting bull wont quit and even though i get him below both vassals, they won't stop being vassals. i finally had to completely wipe out one of his vassals and completely destroy sitting bull before his other vassal w/ only one city left would capitulate. it took me an extra 3 hours to end the game when the ending was obvious. it was a grind.

 

[btgwynn]

Just keep taking their cities. Its all you can do. They'll capitulate eventually, or be dead, either way the problem is solved.

 

[GenerallyGreat]

When dealing with civs with vassals unless the vassal is directly in the way I crush the master until he gives up and his vassals tend to follow suit right after.

 

[Bob the Barbari]

I think it has something to do with their attitude towards their master. If they like him they won't leave him.

 

[De Begerac]

I thought it was all 3 things that needed filling? Population, land mass and, bugger I forget the other one. Generally I've noticed land mass and the other one can be above original levels but they seem to struggle to return population to pre vassal status and break free? (am assuming due to drafting units and/or slavery)

Cyrano

 

[btgwynn]

I thought it was all 3 things that needed filling? Population, land mass and, bugger I forget the other one. Generally I've noticed land mass and the other one can be above original levels but they seem to struggle to return population to pre vassal status and break free? (am assuming due to drafting units and/or slavery)

Cyrano

Only one criteria has to be fulfilled, but the land mass criteria is reversed. For the other two, if the vassal grows back enough he no longer needs protection, but if you reduce the vassal's land mass to half of what is was originally, the master isn't doing a good enough job protecting him, so he can break free.

 

[Spiceweasel]

I thought it was all 3 things that needed filling? Population, land mass and, bugger I forget the other one. Generally I've noticed land mass and the other one can be above original levels but they seem to struggle to return population to pre vassal status and break free? (am assuming due to drafting units and/or slavery)

Cyrano

I don't know about the AI's decisions. But the rules for when they're *allowed* to break free only apply if they are vassals by capitulation. If they're vassals by choice, or by colonization, they can break free whenever they want. And as Bob the Barbarian says, it depends on their attitude. (A colony typically strongly likes their parent state, from what I've seen.)

 

[Dan Quale]

Crush first, threaten later. The fastest way to break away vassals is to pound the master into the stoneage very quickly and bring them to the point of capitulation. Other than that just DOW on the empire and whipe the vassal out completely= no more spies.

It helps if you have insane levels of power and kill his army almost instantly this causes the AI to surrender within a few turns.

 

[Gustavus]

I'd have to agree with Dan Quale. If you destroy a vassal's army quickly, and take cities simultaneously, and those cities are big ones (like capital and important cities), a vassal will roll over in a few turns--often, but not always (personality also plays a part). Burning cities, on the other hand, does probably the exact opposite of netting you a new vassal. If you pull a Sherman, that vassal will hate you more than he fears you, and won't break from a source of power like a master out of fear of you. And wiping out vassals is hard and time-consuming, so I wouldn't necessarily recommend it. I don't know if that's true as far as mechanics go, but it seems to have been my experience.

 

[Negator_UK]

Vassals will also break away from their master when their size relative to the master is big enough. So if you "make the master smaller", they eventually break off. This will take a while if the master was very big to begin with.

 

[_alphaBeta_]

I don't know about the AI's decisions. But the rules for when they're *allowed* to break free only apply if they are vassals by capitulation. If they're vassals by choice, or by colonization, they can break free whenever they want. And as Bob the Barbarian says, it depends on their attitude. (A colony typically strongly likes their parent state, from what I've seen.)

This is the key - are these vassals by choice or capitulation? By choice was already answered. Capitulation is another animal. A vassal will only be given the choice to break away if they have greater than 50% the population AND >50% land under their control. They can also break away if they lose more than 50% of their land from the time they became a vassal. Even then, they can still choose to stay with the master. The relationship is thus:

(>50% pop AND >50% land) OR (<50% original land)

If you weren't paying attention enough to know the answer to my original question, you can mouseover the vassal in the scoreboard. If these 50% conditions are listed under the "vassal of ... " info then they're a capitualated vassal otherwise they're voluntary.