Endless War?

[MestreLion]

In my current game (Vanilla 1.61, Prince, Earth Scenario, Normal speed, Cesar), its around 1880 when i started war with the Chinese. He and japan (Tosugawa) had a defensive pact, so Japan declared war on me. I was expecting that already, and i was ready for a major world war, so ok (im FAR ahead of them on both military and tech).

6 turns later, Chinese civ is eliminated, and i wiped all of Japans main cities, sending him back to stone age.. He only has a 3 tiny cities spread on South and North America. So, i thought, its time to offer peace for a few bucks, regroup my army on transports and crush him 10 turns later.

Sounds great, but... he still refuses to talk !! Ok, maybe i should wait some turns so realizes he lost it... maybe theres a minumum of 10 turns. So i waited more 4 turns and... he still refuses to talk!

I saved the game and just skip turns over and over to see when he will be willing to talk. 10 turns... 15... 20... 25 ! He NEVER talks! He doesnt care if hes capital is now a 3-size city in the middle of the jungle. He refuses sign peace! Hes obviusly annoyed/furious with a -15 diplo towards me, but... NO TALK ?? My economy is completely breaking apart with WW, what should i do??? Is this a bug or something?!?!?

 

[RandomLeader]

Simply go and raze remaining cities. It's not your fault that he is stupid.

 

[Neal]

Yeah, Tokugawa's a jerk. What else is new?

You said you wanted peace to regroup your transports. Well, if he won't declare peace, but he's pretty much crippled, why not just regroup your transports? What's he gonna do, shake his fist at you across the Atlantic?

 

[Diamondeye]

eat him. fast.

 

[TeraHammer]

Toku does probably more harm to you than any other civ could

Nice one, toku!

 

[RandomLeader]

This reminds me from game where I learned to hate togu. It was a time that I didn't know better to build military.

I was in a small Island with togu (large, continents map) and I was outteching togu like hell and building infra. So surprise surprise.. togu kick the living hell out of me. The game was going like a dream before that and I was getting wonders etc. etc. etc.

That was a very important lesson. After that I have gone little personal with togu and no matter how peacufull I am in some games, I allways kill togu if there is a even remote chance to do it. Ok.. not every time but for me togu is a red flag and when comparing him to Monty.. Monty is a most reliable friend you can have

 

[MestreLion]

Toku does probably more harm to you than any other civ could

Nice one, toku!

Yes, thats why im SO pissed! Of course i can regroup and easily wipe him of the planet, but that will take many turns. I need to get transports ready, and they need to cross the whole atlantic... or the whole pacific ocean. Thats 6+ turns. And after razing like 15 citiies and 100+ unitis, my WW is HUGE (around 16 for major cities... WITH Mt Rushmore AND Jail)

But thats not my main point. My concern is: is this a bug or can the AI really refuses to talk forever ? Will i be in war for him forever, until i wipe him?

Im not worried about this game in particular... this one is won already. But... an AI refusing to talk forever, specially during war, can have major implications in many games. It can really wreck my economy apart, and i will have to think much more carefully before going to war ever again, on any game, against any civ. So, is this a bug, a feature, a strategy used by AI, or just Toku needs 30+ turns to have a lil chat with me?

 

[NaZdReG]

drop research.. increase culture and go kick his butt. other than the worldbuilder its pretty much your only option.

atleast it will give you a toe-hold on the other continent without pissing anyone off should make further conquests much easier.

NaZ

 

[MestreLion]

There are no further conquests... Europe, Africa and Asia are mine, only Gengis Khan is left, and he is completely surrounded by 40 Modern Armors in his pathetic 10-city civ in the middle of the tundra defended with rifleman... this game is not my concern...

My question was about the specific situation where an AI in war with you will refuses to tal indefinatly, even after 30+ turns. Have anyone else seen this? Is this normal? Is it a bugor something? Should it be a concern on my next games or its just one those 1-in-a-million things thats depend on so many weird factors that it wont ever likely happen again?

 

[Dnomal]

There are no further conquests... Europe, Africa and Asia are mine, only Gengis Khan is left, and he is completely surrounded by 40 Modern Armors in his pathetic 10-city civ in the middle of the tundra defended with rifleman... this game is not my concern...

My question was about the specific situation where an AI in war with you will refuses to tal indefinatly, even after 30+ turns. Have anyone else seen this? Is this normal? Is it a bugor something? Should it be a concern on my next games or its just one those 1-in-a-million things thats depend on so many weird factors that it wont ever likely happen again?

Oh no it happens quite a lot to me, especially if they started the game, and if there's no loss from them. It really annoys me. Doesn't stop me wiping them out.

As a previous poster said, go mad on culture and wait while researching....

 

[Refar]

Well the AI has its pride as well

I noticed that the AI sometimes switches to the 'Refusing to Talk' state when you pissed them off to much (like Razed many cities). This can only end one way - you destroying him. And also AI tends not to actually feel treatened by a army being somewhere else, even if it is a huge army. At least not too much.

So definitely this IS something you have to worry about in your future games, when concidering to start a war and to burn some of your rivals cities. I do not think of this as being a bug however. Not being able to choose when to stop it, is one of the more common risks when going to war.

 

[oyzar]

Just adopt police state?

 

[Komori]

I had one moment similar, but with lower losses on my side.

I was on a continent with a few other civs, but me and the Incas were the only ones with different religions. They run a Theocracy and I had founded christianity and felt like adopting it. The way religion was in the continent was this: Someone created Hinduism and it spread real fast. Even to Inca, before the theocracy. Then someone founded Islam and it spread even faster, and that someone makes the apostolic palace. Guess what happened? Everyone converted. But me. And Inca. They didn't had a single city with muslin presence, I, however, had a few. Since I had votes, I kept voting no and Never! to any act against Inca, and became real close friend of them (we didn't share religon but everyone else disliked us for that, so at least we had that in common).

The thing is, at some point it became impossible for me to say another never, all my people were starting to hate me. I was then obliged to ban all trades with inca. They, who were actually pleased with me at the time, went to annoyed and refused to talk. So far (hadn't finished the game) they keep not talking to me, and I lost one of my best trade partners. Damn.

 

[Warspite2]

This reminds me from game where I learned to hate togu. It was a time that I didn't know better to build military.

I was in a small Island with togu (large, continents map) and I was outteching togu like hell and building infra. So surprise surprise.. togu kick the living hell out of me. The game was going like a dream before that and I was getting wonders etc. etc. etc.

That was a very important lesson. After that I have gone little personal with togu and no matter how peacufull I am in some games, I allways kill togu if there is a even remote chance to do it. Ok.. not every time but for me togu is a red flag and when comparing him to Monty.. Monty is a most reliable friend you can have

Yeah I just finished a similar game about 5 minutes ago. Tokugawa kicked the ever living hell out of me. I was furious! One of those classic nearly broke my desk and keyboard kind of games. I was doing so well until he ruined it by delcaring war on me which lasted ages. Not to mention I was having the worse luck during the whole war. I have it out for him now, next game I see him I am going after him. He will suffer for that outrage! Tokugawa look out!

 

[Gnarfflinger]

Charlemagne and Julius Ceaser are the ones I have trouble with. They tend to declare war with seemingly nothing to gain, drag friends into the party and refuse to talk...

 

[Diamondeye]

@Randomleader:
Caesar once did that to me while I was India - I was doing really well, pumping out wonders and aiming for cultural win with him and Hatty as neighboors - both at pleased. Then suddenly he DoWs and wrecks my empire to ruins. I love to play pacifistic, but you've got to be ready for war .

@Poster: I think only leaders with a very high feeling of honor, like Toku or Genghis does this, but I've seen Izzy do it once aswell. Dunno. Kill him anyway.

 

[travathian]

@Randomleader:
Caesar once did that to me while I was India - I was doing really well, pumping out wonders and aiming for cultural win with him and Hatty as neighboors - both at pleased. Then suddenly he DoWs and wrecks my empire to ruins. I love to play pacifistic, but you've got to be ready for war .

No, you need to be powerful enough that they wont consider attacking you. A small, but fully upgraded army helps keep your power ranking high enough to have them looking elsewhere for a kill. Why didnt you have a defensive pact with him or Hatty?

 

[jimbob27]

My question was about the specific situation where an AI in war with you will refuses to tal indefinatly, even after 30+ turns. Have anyone else seen this? Is this normal? Is it a bugor something? Should it be a concern on my next games or its just one those 1-in-a-million things thats depend on so many weird factors that it wont ever likely happen again?

It's something they decide to do on occasions. It's not a bug or anything. Eventually he'll talk, but it might be a long long time.

From his point of view, maintaining war can make sence. He knows at that point he can't do anything with his military to hurt you, but he can still hurt you through war-weariness.

He might know that his civ is slightly too large for another AI to vassalise, and if he maintains the war; you'll take another city, which will allow him to ask somebody else to vassalise him and attack you in the process.

From his point of view, it's probably preferable to be vassal to a winning civ, rather than just make peace, and live out the rest of history as a crappy undefended civ with 3 cities and no hope for expansion.

 

[MestreLion]

Pretty smart AI, btw...

Oh, and im playing Vanilla, so no vassalise or anything like that...

 

[fearuin]

Well, now you see... the power of rogue nations!

This situation has never happened to me, I'm usually for short wars with limited targets. But well, if you were playing to conquer the world, this is a problem. But I just had an idea. You have modern armors, no? You have transports, as well. So you have modern battle gear. Have you forgot the most useful tool of the modern warmonger?: NUKES!
Just nuke him to the bitter end!