being denounced

There seems to be almost no correlation between actual relations and being denounced, haha. In one game as Japan, the US quickly became a runaway civ and attacked 3-4 other powers on their side of the map. They maintained friendly relations with me (we didn't come close to bordering one another at the time) and offered me repeated DOCs. Then, out of the blue, 2 turns after a DOC, he denounces me - 8 turns later is friends again, and another 25+ turns later denounces me again.

I had no idea what made him hate me so, as the only diplo hits I had with him were regarding the fact that I had made DOCs with his enemies.

 

Taking a city state, killing a civ (taking it's last city) is ONE OF THE WORST thing you can do in game, it INSTANTLY adds a huge amount of negative diplomatic score.

The Diplomacy system works perfectly according to the rules, I think we have a thread here with the hard data on how it works. It makes perfect sense after you know what the rules are, the problem is you can't figure out the rules just by playing the game.

 

I was completely frustrated with getting denounced after I was attacked. I would attack back, take a city, sign peace, and get denounced for warmongering by the civ that first attacked me. Then I would get denounced by other civs for warmongering.

My solution was: I denounce immediately upon signing the peace treaty. Even if the civ that attacked me denounces me back, the other civs don't seem to follow.

 

The thing couple posters above seem to forget is that taking a city-state carries a pretty serious diplomatic penalty. In at least one of those stories, the city was a protected one. Combine that with the fact that both games were against very many opponents. Denouncing might be cumulative (correct me if I am mistaken), so if you have tens of instances of denounce from other civs, I'm sure they hate your guts enough to go to war with you.

 

There are quite a few reasons why this could happens so we can only speculate. But it isn't uncommon to be denounced/DoW by multiple civs all at once.

In regards to denouncements, I think it is usually the case that multiple civs relations with you is borderline with the denouncement level, and once the first civ denounces you it starts a chain reaction where all of a sudden your reputation it at the level with multiple civs where they will denounce you.

It can also be the case where a civ denounces you and then demands that another civ denounces you. But I don't think their is anyway to know that this has happened in any specific case unless someone made a mod indicating it has.

 

To the AIs defense, thats what happened to Adolphus and William in my last two games So you cant expect them to act differently.

On topic: The AI will denounce you 'for no apparent reason' when it thinks you are inferior on every front. If this continues to be the case for several turns you will have an army knocking on your door. Hasn't nobody had Alex as his neighbor? All he is doing is insulting and denounce you till you break his teeth.