Double crossing AI all invaded me at once!

[Brutus2]

Ok, so I'm on a rather large island with Japan to my West and Russia to my East. Not happy about being in the middle but nothing I can do about that. I'm playing Louis of France which is Creative and Industrious.

Early game things are going great. Creative trait expands my borders very quickly and soon I have control of a huge area in the center of the continent. Japan is trapped in a small area but Russia has a good chunck of land and some good resources. I happen to grab the only stone and marble resources available and not only that but I discovered bronze working and metal working first which allows iron and copper to show up on the map and I grab those too.

Meanwhile I also manage to found two religions and build stonehenge which eventually gives me 2 Great Prophets and two Holy Cities, both with Shrines! Things are going good for me.

Now I know war is unavoidable so I make nice with Russia since they are the much greater threat. I have lots of trade deals with them and have given them lots of free techs and free resources (but not any strategic resources like iron or copper). Anyway Peter is pleased with me so that's good.

I start to build up some cats and swordmen with barracks in every city and Vassalage civic so I am getting 2 free promotions with each unit built and Guilds and Civil Service techs are on the horizon which will give me Macemen and Knights... a big advantage over both of my neighbors.

Then Japan declares war. Ok, I saw that coming. He was blocked in with no room to expand and has been annoyed at me since day one. I have only just begun building my army and he had invasion forces ready to go but I am not worried. I have very good production cities and I can hold him off till the Knights and Macemen start to roll out.

My only worry is Peter over there in Russia. I contact him but of course he has no desire to join me against Japan (red - not even an option). But he his pleased and we have lots of trade deals together so I am thinking we are ok. WRONG.

Next turn Russia also declares war on me... not good. Ok, so now I am being invaded on both sides but I'm mad and ready to fight back. Just wait until my Knights and Macemen with 2 free promotions start to roll out!

Russia sends its first invasion force directly at my only source of Iron. They quickly cut me off and I only managed to build one Knight!

Needless to say it was all down hill from there. Sure I could build longbowmen and hide in my cities and maybe stay alive but they both had large invasion forces coming in. They cut off my Iron and were pillaging improvemnts all over my empire.

I thought that by kissing up to Peter I could keep him on my side if war broke out with me and Japan but boy was I wrong. I guess me being in the middle they both decided to take me down and split my empire between them!

 

[one_man_assault]

yea I assume the AI is much more cunning this time around

 

[Dr. Broom]

It isn't really cunning it is just the AI club where it likes to screw over human players and trade goods and techs cheaper to other AIs as well as being more likely to help out other AIs than humans. It has been doing this since civ III, probably before too but I can't say for sure since I didn't play I at all and didn't play II much.

 

[TrailblazingScot]

It isn't really cunning it is just the AI club where it likes to screw over human players and trade goods and techs cheaper to other AIs as well as being more likely to help out other AIs than humans. It has been doing this since civ III, probably before too but I can't say for sure since I didn't play I at all and didn't play II much.

Have you actually got CivIV, because that isn't sitting well with my experience. I've yet to see the dogpile or the horrid tech swapping of CivIII.

 

[KristoferX]

Ok, so I'm on a rather large island with Japan to my West and Russia to my East. Not happy about being in the middle but nothing I can do about that. I'm playing Louis of France which is Creative and Industrious.

Early game things are going great. Creative trait expands my borders very quickly and soon I have control of a huge area in the center of the continent. Japan is trapped in a small area but Russia has a good chunck of land and some good resources. I happen to grab the only stone and marble resources available and not only that but I discovered bronze working and metal working first which allows iron and copper to show up on the map and I grab those too.

Meanwhile I also manage to found two religions and build stonehenge which eventually gives me 2 Great Prophets and two Holy Cities, both with Shrines! Things are going good for me.

Now I know war is unavoidable so I make nice with Russia since they are the much greater threat. I have lots of trade deals with them and have given them lots of free techs and free resources (but not any strategic resources like iron or copper). Anyway Peter is pleased with me so that's good.

I start to build up some cats and swordmen with barracks in every city and Vassalage civic so I am getting 2 free promotions with each unit built and Guilds and Civil Service techs are on the horizon which will give me Macemen and Knights... a big advantage over both of my neighbors.

Then Japan declares war. Ok, I saw that coming. He was blocked in with no room to expand and has been annoyed at me since day one. I have only just begun building my army and he had invasion forces ready to go but I am not worried. I have very good production cities and I can hold him off till the Knights and Macemen start to roll out.

My only worry is Peter over there in Russia. I contact him but of course he has no desire to join me against Japan (red - not even an option). But he his pleased and we have lots of trade deals together so I am thinking we are ok. WRONG.

Next turn Russia also declares war on me... not good. Ok, so now I am being invaded on both sides but I'm mad and ready to fight back. Just wait until my Knights and Macemen with 2 free promotions start to roll out!

Russia sends its first invasion force directly at my only source of Iron. They quickly cut me off and I only managed to build one Knight!

Needless to say it was all down hill from there. Sure I could build longbowmen and hide in my cities and maybe stay alive but they both had large invasion forces coming in. They cut off my Iron and were pillaging improvemnts all over my empire.

I thought that by kissing up to Peter I could keep him on my side if war broke out with me and Japan but boy was I wrong. I guess me being in the middle they both decided to take me down and split my empire between them!

How well defended are your cities? Do they have walls? So far the only time I've had the AI attack me out of nowhere is when my border cities were not sufficiently defended. I don't know if that's the case here, but it could be.

 

[Greek Plunder]

I've had a weak Aztec civ attack me before when my border cities were well defended. Having unprotected cities isn't the only cause for war with the AI.

 

[peanutgu]

I think it is not oddness because the same thing happened in the CIV III. But I am anxious to know can I change the Red words to white, how can I do? In the CIVIII, if you give AI so many money and techs, he will help you.

 

[TheDervish]

I've been double teamed by AI before. Heck, once I got invaded by barbarians, war declared on by Incas, and French demanding 120 gold pieces while I'm down and out. Then in another game, I had America boxed in, I was doing better than Russia, then Russia declared war on America. I think when your civ starts to get weak or shows vulnerabilities, things snowball. You'll have multiple people attacking you sometimes. :/

 

[holodmer]

I can understand why the AI has attacked you since it prolly analyse the situation and came to a solution

- you were weaker then Japan -> you get Invaded and Japan gets to stronger, therefor he joins the war (since joining WITH you seems out of question for him) to get a piece of the cake

- you were stronger then Japan -> you would win and get to strong for him, therefor he joined war

I would guess he was the strongest and prefered to keep the status quo or at least make sure the odds dont turn against him over time

In my Opinion its a good thing that the AI dosnt ignore facts even if they are friends with you

compare it with today ... we are friends with France, but if they Invaded Spain we sure wont sit there and watch it happen

in a more aggresive era we wont want our rival to take over all the good areas

 

[remconius]

Having all strategic resources gives the Russians motive.

And what better time to declare then when your opponent is at war with his other neighbour, grab iron and voila you're in business..... Could be a human strategy.

It be interesting to see what happens if you reload and see what happens if you trade iron to Russians.....

 

[Brutus2]

Oh, I completly understand why they both had motive to attack me. In fact the purpose of my post was not to complain about being ganged up on, rather to show how smart the AI is. I also wanted to point out that in Civ IV no amount of gifts will stop an AI from doing what is in their best interest. Again this goes to show how smart the AI is. Russia was pleased with me and I had many trade deals with them, but they needed to expand and get more resources so Pleased or not, it was in their best interest to attack me especially after Japan invaded first.

All free land on our island had be claimed and I was in the middle of the two AIs. The only way for them to expand their borders was to attack me. In fact as a creative civ my borders almost completly surrounded two of Japan's cities and one of Russia's. I was expecting one of them to culture flip to me at some point but they never did. I suppose Peter could use the Open Borders I gave him to move through my territory and attack Japan but why would he want to capture cities which would be cut off from the rest of his empire.

As for trading Iron to Russia, I could not do that because I only had the one source of Iron. I guess I could have given it to him temporarily and just fought Japan without Iron since I don't think Japan had Iron either but Japan had more troops then me, I was counting on my superior Knights and Macemen to over power his larger force of weaker axmen and horse archers.

 

[Ephor]

That happens A LOT. I wish the game would explain that AIs will always attack if they think they can get your only source of copper/iron/horses/ivory and cripple you militarily. I often wonder why in the world an AI attacked me out of no where until my supply line is cut.

I don't think it's a flaw in the AI though, it just makes a point. More than anything, civs will go to war because they think they can win.

 

[Shillen]

The AI's are a lot smarter this time around. I was playing a space race game the other day. Mali was the tech leader in the game and was discovering techs at a nearly 2-1 pace over me in the modern age. Unfortunately they weren't going for all the spaceship techs only so I was nearly caught up on those while they were learning flight and crap like that. But they were still ahead and building their casings. Well I noticed that their only source of aluminum was actually a small town they had on my continent. So I got a great artist and stole the aluminium from him with cultural expansion. The entire game Mali had been pleased with me. But about 10 turns later when I took the lead in the spaceship buildling race they declared war on me to try and slow me down. I had a weak navy so they pillaged all my fish/crabs/whales with their subs. This made my cities unhapy and unhealthy so they couldn't produce spaceship parts as well. I did end up winning but I thought it was pretty smart of the AI to go to war with me when it realized I was going to beat it to the spaceship.

 

[Gustomucho81]

I wish the AI would try to double or triple cross me, I have tanks and bombers and they just got gunpowder..

I am about to go all out war for my end game against : Washington, Catherine, Mali guy, Chinese and Arabes..

I already took out Roman and French.