Can we have a better casus belli option?

[halfhalfharp]

Currently we have religion, freeing captured cities and colonizing wars. They already covered a large area for us to justify our wars.

But I just feel something is missing. The casus belli option allows only one single civilization against another. That is really troubling when you want your ally to go war together while the joint war penalty is huge. This can not make sense.

Can we make the casus belli available to joint other civilizations? The war penatly is independently measured, of course. ( Lets say I have a casus belli option while my ally doesn't. When we go to joint war, i gain my casus belli benefits when he cannot)

Also I hope to have a "break diplomatic promise" casus belli. Especially when dealing with promises of no spying and city settling, this is a justification to war but we dont have the option here.

Finally, why cant we buy another civilization into war this time? It is an important tactics to win allies against the common enemy.

What do you guys think? Free to add anything you think that can improve the diplomacy in Civ VI

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

Here are things the AI/Opponent has done in games that have made me want to go to war against him:

1. Attacking/taking a City State that I was getting bonuses from, or wanted to get bonuses from (You took away Zanzibar, you #$@^%& Aztecs!)
2. Settling too close. As part of this, it would be nice to be able to set 'markers' indicating 'Areas of Interest' not necessarily within our borders, but that we are anticipating, for a lesser Casus - like that newly-revealed bunch of Niter or Iron a few tiles away from my nearest city...
3. Missionaries, Apostles, et al swarming my territory. Since the 'Hidden Agendas' make a large part of the Diplomacy System random as it is, and the AI is hopeless at war, I usually simply Declare War, kill them all, then ignore the AI until he's ready to make peace, but this should result in larger penalties (No International Trade Routes with Civs Friendly to my enemy?) and there really needs to be an 'intermediate solution'.

The real problem, as I see it, is that in virtually every game I've had 'Declared Friends' declare war on me so, frankly, I have started ignoring all Diplomacy, and haven't seen it make a Froggy bit of difference. Until the basic Diplomacy/AI warmaking Ineptitudiness is solved, Casus Belli doesn't matter a whole lot.

 

[Disgustipated]

Well we still don't know the nature of these new alliance systems. Perhaps it will make it easier to use joint wars without as much penalty. We don't know yet.

 

[HorseshoeHermit]

There should not be a break promise casus. The balance of the game partly is constituted by the distinction between actionable offenses, which are few and obvious, and the inactionable delinquencies of "diplomacy", which are not offenses but merely offensive. Acting on the diplomatic stage requires managing and even swallowing such offenses. Bullying a city state maybe could have a casus belli if you've socially progressed to having a formal relationship to it, but before that it's just a thumbing of the nose. Catching spies in your territory, likewise, can't become an international case because , in context, the foreign power just denies all knowledge of the agent and you have no proof.

Perhaps there could be room for a few more casi unlocked by civics or even techs. Civ 4 mods introduced a tech for photography, which enables an advanced spy, and we can imagine how photographic evidence could be very relevant to diplomatic petitions.

I also agree that borders as a whole are in an aggravating state. I have long wanted the ability to free-hand draw border lines in treaties. And the fact that joint wars get the war penalties is just pathetic to me. Joint wars are the first casus belli, made justified by the fact you roped someone else into it! And not for money, but for the change in diplomatic attitude itself.

 

[Gabhar]

Casus belli is a nice idea in principle, but really the whole diplo and effectiveness of war needs to be changed quite a bit for anything satisfactory. The penalties for warring aren't meaningful because usually everybody dislikes you unless you put a lot of effort into building a relationship, to which there's almost no real benefit. Additionally any reduction in penalties (that isn't to 0) often ends up being nullified by the inevitable denouncements that stall diplo for a significant amount of time. What's really needed is a deeper diplomatic layer.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Currently we have religion, freeing captured cities and colonizing wars. They already covered a large area for us to justify our wars.

But I just feel something is missing. The casus belli option allows only one single civilization against another. That is really troubling when you want your ally to go war together while the joint war penalty is huge. This can not make sense.

Can we make the casus belli available to joint other civilizations? The war penatly is independently measured, of course. ( Lets say I have a casus belli option while my ally doesn't. When we go to joint war, i gain my casus belli benefits when he cannot)

Also I hope to have a "break diplomatic promise" casus belli. Especially when dealing with promises of no spying and city settling, this is a justification to war but we dont have the option here.

Finally, why cant we buy another civilization into war this time? It is an important tactics to win allies against the common enemy.

What do you guys think? Free to add anything you think that can improve the diplomacy in Civ VI

Theoretically, "break diplomatic promise" is covered by Denounciation prior to declaring war. What I want is for some of the Cassus Belli to be moved to earlier parts of the Civic Tree, like Holy Wars being available at either Theology or Divine Right, & Protectorate CB's being available at Early Empire.....that kind of thing.

 

[halfhalfharp]

Theoretically, "break diplomatic promise" is covered by Denounciation prior to declaring war. What I want is for some of the Cassus Belli to be moved to earlier parts of the Civic Tree, like Holy Wars being available at either Theology or Divine Right, & Protectorate CB's being available at Early Empire.....that kind of thing.

Its kind of covered by Denouncing. But as I remember there is kind of betrayal penalty back in Civ V. That makes making promises a thing to the whole world and breaking the promises disgrace yourself more.

Yeah I also agree that casus belli comes in too late. The warring penalty is still so high after its halved by casus belli. You know, the penalty gets higher in later eras. The defense pact also comes too late

 

[halfhalfharp]

Casus belli is a nice idea in principle, but really the whole diplo and effectiveness of war needs to be changed quite a bit for anything satisfactory. The penalties for warring aren't meaningful because usually everybody dislikes you unless you put a lot of effort into building a relationship, to which there's almost no real benefit. Additionally any reduction in penalties (that isn't to 0) often ends up being nullified by the inevitable denouncements that stall diplo for a significant amount of time. What's really needed is a deeper diplomatic layer.

Agree. Why there isnt more chances that we can please the AI? I think it's important to build up relationships even if we are going to war. There should be a way to go to war without pissing the AIs off.

The thing is they hate you warring when they are doing this themselves. And the balance of all relationships just sink into infinitely negative. Should we have the warring penalty reduced to civilizations that already are in war or had war like 5 turns ago?