[GS] Emergencies have become an unavoidable exploit

[Greasy Dave]

I liked emergencies in R and F. They didn't happen all the time. I warred early to mid game, sometimes an emergency was called against me, sometimes it wasn't. More often I joined emergencies against the AI to liberate CSes or get a DOW against a runaway without penalties. Sometimes I'd lose because the city I had to liberate was a long ways beyond my borders and my neighbour hadn't joined and I had to slog through the runaways cities to get there. Mostly I won and got a nice gold reward. But they didn't happen so often that I felt it was exploitative. Sometimes an emergency was called but noone would join - probably assessing my military strength correctly.

Compare that to G S. My playstyle hasn't changed. I still war from early-mid game, maybe beyond. Nows the AI always declares an emergency after I take its first or second city. Neighboring civs always join. They always lose. I get a bunch of favour which is good for nothing - so I sell it and the exploit begins. After 20 turns I've not finished my conquest - I'm not trying to exploit anyone, I'm trying to expand - I roll on and after I take another large city, another emergency is declared. The same dumb civs join - these are civs that sent no units against me in the first emergency, or the civ that has already lost all its cities and units during the first emergency. Twenty turns later I get more favour, which again I sell - buy more units, upgrade units, invest...whatever. Now when the AI asks for peace I feel like accepting not because I'm done taking capitals but because the whole stupid circle feels too much of an exploit. I'm not complaining about the AI's lack of military skills,or the ridiculous pillaging rewards. I'm complaining about a mechanic that I can't avoid, that the devs put in and is hopelessly skewed in giving me a ton reward for doing nothing, rewarding me every time I war.

Don't get me started on the permanent golden age that's achievable when warring from industrial era onwards earning stupid era points every time the player kills a vet unit or a corps-which is pretty much every unit late game. There's no era score for staying peaceful...just dumb points for warring - why is that a good idea?

I don't know why the AI joins these emergencies. Not sure what they changed from R and F to GS but it's broken and very frustrating. Maybe, the AI doesn't seem to be able to assess military strength of an opponent correctly - or it's tallying its naval units against a land army -who knows.

 

[iammaxhailme]

I think the real problem is the lack of use for diplomatic favor, and yet the AI will pay a TON of gold for it.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

I think the real problem is the lack of use for diplomatic favor, and yet the AI will pay a TON of gold for it.

'Diplomatic Favor', so far at least, appears to be another Neat Concept somebody at Firaxis dreamed up that they then failed to follow up on. I frequently start getting 1 - 2 points of Favor per turn early in the game, and the AI Civs fall all over themselves trading Gold and other useful goods to me for 2 - 4 points of 'Favor'.

IF it was intended to be a 'new currency', then what differentiates it from Gold or Religion as a way to buy things you genuinely need in the game things like Units or Buildings? If it is a Trade Item, then what does it do to give it any value?

And if, as one would naturally suppose, it is related to Diplomacy, then what is its Diplomatic Purpose? Maybe it's because I haven't played enough games far enough, but I haven't seen any specific Diplomatic purpose to it, other than a bit of good feeling toward me because I am trading something with the AI - a good feeling I can get just as much or more of by sending a resourceless Trade Route to them or trading a Strategic/Amenity Resource or Gold.

 

[Battlehelm043]

They need to adjust how the diplomacy works in GS as it stands. Diplomatic favor is slow to accumulate and you don't get enough until late game. Further an exploitation of barb camps for +3 era score, and the DoF leading to perma-friendships limits Diplomacy, so you cannot appropriately use Casus Belli or even backstab if necessary. Heck you can't even Denounce a friend when they do something egregious; which is horrible because if you wait till after the DoF is over you are made the bad guy for Denouncing for no apparent reason since your Grievances have run their course by that time. I like the golden era mechanic as an idea, but it seems to dictate the game and interrupt the natural flow of the game. Eliminating the natural feel makes the game feel like a board game instead of the 4x strategy game it is suppose to be.

 

[Disgustipated]

I wouldn't say unavoidable. I have been avoiding it. I mostly play peacefully, but even in my Egypt game where I had to expand with chariot archers I did not trigger an emergency despite wiping out 3 civs. The reason being I finished before the end of the classical era.

 

[Victoria]

I complained a day after release... I had done a toa rush, everyone hated me, but I had nearly 1K diplomatic favour, a lot from emergencies and freeing CS.
Game is so broken currently.

 

[Pietato]

If you could make proposals to the World Congress it would be better. As Eleanor, I made the Theatre District buildings produce faster with my first meeting, which used up most of my favour.

 

[bonafide11]

The diplomacy / diplomatic favor / World Congress sounded cool when announced, but it was clearly rushed and not thought out well enough to be adequately implemented. Hopefully a patch can fix it.

 

[MaryKB]

I had a really annoying emergency. So in my game, the Inca captured Washington, and Teddy called for an emergency to help him. Okies, I want in on this, as does like most of the world. So then after this, Teddy comes on and lectures me about starting wars on his continent, and he now has like a -17 for me fighting on his continent, and a +3 for being in an emergency with him. I just feel that's so silly, he asks me to help him get his city back, he's kinda happy I'm doing it, but he's also extremely mad at me for doing it to???

Also I feel the World Congress is just a total waste, I'm mostly ignoring it. I feel Civilization 6's was sooo much better, I feel like it really matters and you play a diplomatic game trying to get your resolutions passed, and some really have big impacts (like World Ideology, if you pass that you can really cause problems for your enemies). But now I don't care about like 99% of what's happening, and emergencies that just give you diplomatic favor seem like I couldn't care less, because it's just an endless cycle of selling that now. Someone gives me gold and diplomatic favor for my bonus luxury, so I take it. Then another person bugs me for my diplomatic favor with gold. And like whenever I get even just 2 or 3 favor points, everyone immediately wants it.

*sigh*

 

[Iberian]

My favorite was when Gitara offered me a joint war trade vs Persia. Perfect, I wanted to kill him anyway. Capture a small 2 pop city that he had forward settled on me about 3 turns in and boom emergency which Gitara joins and moves from my ally killing Persia to Persia's ally attacking me all in the space of 3 turns on a war that was all her idea. Nice work Firaxis. Next time you should exclude civs in a joint war from declaring.

 

[gunnergoz]

Yeah, come to think of it, I did enjoy the old World Congress was better and more fun to play. This is just a kind of slot machine with outcomes I didn't care about going in.

 

[FenrisWolf456]

My favorite was when Gitara offered me a joint war trade vs Persia. Perfect, I wanted to kill him anyway. Capture a small 2 pop city that he had forward settled on me about 3 turns in and boom emergency which Gitara joins and moves from my ally killing Persia to Persia's ally attacking me all in the space of 3 turns on a war that was all her idea. Nice work Firaxis. Next time you should exclude civs in a joint war from declaring.

And yet, if it happened the other way around, that it was you that convinced Gitarja to join in with you, she captured a city and an emergency called on her ... would you not be at least tempted to 'backstab' and join in on the emergency? Some players may even consider this clever play, as you convinced a rival into a war and ended up turning a portion of the world against them (I've seen many threads of players paying AIs to attack another civ, so that they could later take advantage of both after weakening each other from war)

The joint war was seen as advantageous for Gitarja at the time you both declared the war. The emergency threw in a twist that proved more tempting and advantageous. If you don't want her switching sides like that, then you should be allies.

Admittedly, it is one of the annoying things I find about the Emergency system. I dislike the forced peace that comes between joint members. I've had a couple of wars interrupted by an Emergency that I joined only to find out my rival joined too. So long sweet peace negotiations.

 

[Iberian]

And yet, if it happened the other way around, that it was you that convinced Gitarja to join in with you, she captured a city and an emergency called on her ... would you not be at least tempted to 'backstab' and join in on the emergency? Some players may even consider this clever play, as you convinced a rival into a war and ended up turning a portion of the world against them (I've seen many threads of players paying AIs to attack another civ, so that they could later take advantage of both after weakening each other from war)

The joint war was seen as advantageous for Gitarja at the time you both declared the war. The emergency threw in a twist that proved more tempting and advantageous. If you don't want her switching sides like that, then you should be allies.

Admittedly, it is one of the annoying things I find about the Emergency system. I dislike the forced peace that comes between joint members. I've had a couple of wars interrupted by an Emergency that I joined only to find out my rival joined too. So long sweet peace negotiations.

It didn't matter because the AI can't war to save its life (literally) so it just means I get a free declaration of war on her. Ironically City States are a life saver. Make sure you keep the one between you and your enemy and they will throw troops at it and if you are lucky they will conquer it so you can liberate it and get that sweet favor and envoys all for free.