[R&F] Free cities.

[Tech Osen]

I'm not at home so can't make an exact quote but in the civilopedia it's suggested that free city units will leave you alone unless you attack them. But every free city I encountered so far was hostile and send units across my border on suicide missions.
Which also means I don't have to declare war to attack them and apparantly also no warmongering penalty for conquering them. Anyone else find that a bit odd?
I was also surprised that conquered city states that break free don't return to city state status but become free cities. Could liberate them into city state status upon conquering them though.

 

[pietro1990]

They behave like barbarians agressive towards everyone

i agree on the city states its really wierd to see a conquered city state become a free city instead of a city state

 

[Animist7]

Totally agree. I don't understand the logic behind essentially making them barbarians when they're just citizens seeking independence. Why should we be at war with them? Especially if it's our culture / loyalty that instigated their rebellion!

Some people might like the fact that you can conquer a free city without a warmongering penalty but I say this is an instance where warmongering penalties should apply! A free city ought to have its freedom celebrated by the major civs, except perhaps the original civ and their allies, in which case conquering one ought to be seen as warmongering.

What I would really love is for a free city to start out as just a neutral city that you can't really interact with, much like in R+F at the moment, but which you aren't automatically at war with. You can DoW but there are warmongering penalties. If no-one conquers them or flips them to their civ for a while, maybe they can evolve into city states with a random set of suzerain bonuses applied, envoys, quests and so forth?

Maybe that last bit is too much. But at the very least, let them just be a neutral free city instead of a city of barbarians!

 

[pgm123]

I'm not at home so can't make an exact quote but in the civilopedia it's suggested that free city units will leave you alone unless you attack them. But every free city I encountered so far was hostile and send units across my border on suicide missions.
Which also means I don't have to declare war to attack them and apparantly also no warmongering penalty for conquering them. Anyone else find that a bit odd?
I was also surprised that conquered city states that break free don't return to city state status but become free cities. Could liberate them into city state status upon conquering them though.

Seems to be a bug, from what was said.

 

[Grumpbeard]

I was also surprised that conquered city states that break free don't return to city state status but become free cities. Could liberate them into city state status upon conquering them though.

I was in an "emergency" last night where Germany took Zanzibar. We of course had to liberate Zanzibar. Zanzibar went to Free City status, and we immediately got the completion of the emergency. There's some weirdness there, definitely.

 

[Trengilly]

It would be so much better if the Free City units just stayed within their borders. I had Gilgamesh drop into a dark age while being next to me and another civ in golden ages -- three of his cities went into free city status, and promptly sent half a dozen infantry across my borders to attack me. I'm busy fighting them off while I wait for the countdown until the free cities joined me. Very odd. If nothing else they could have stayed in their home city and fought Gilgamesh who had troops running around.

 

[Uberfrog]

Do they attack even when your troops are (more than a couple of tiles) away from their borders?

I have noticed suicidal attacks, but only when my troops were within or adjacent to their borders. While the particular tactical choices may be dumb, having them unable to attack your units unless you explicitly attack does not seem a sensible solution. It makes sense that they consider you a threat whenever you're nearby, given the perma-war.

 

[bonafide11]

I was in an "emergency" last night where Germany took Zanzibar. We of course had to liberate Zanzibar. Zanzibar went to Free City status, and we immediately got the completion of the emergency. There's some weirdness there, definitely.

I've had the same thing. Got credit for liberating the city even though I didn't get any of my troops there yet because the city rebelled.

 

[Animist7]

It makes sense that they consider you a threat whenever you're nearby, given the perma-war.

I don't have an issue with the tactics but with the fact there's a perma-war status in the first place. I don't get why cities that want to break away from their parent civ are considered barbarians.

 

[Uberfrog]

I don't have an issue with the tactics but with the fact there's a perma-war status in the first place. I don't get why cities that want to break away from their parent civ are considered barbarians.

I think it's because they don't exist as players on the diplomatic stage. Given that they are generally temporary entities (they will either flip back, or else defect to another civ), they took the decision not to make them akin to City-States. They instead belong to the "Free Cities" quasi-civilisation, which for simplicity is at permanent war with all major civs. The alternative would be a quite complicated system of temporary city-states where you would have to allow players to declare war, worry about open-borders, allies/suzerains, etc. I'm not sure this is worth the effort for cities that generally last around 10 turns.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Totally agree. I don't understand the logic behind essentially making them barbarians when they're just citizens seeking independence. Why should we be at war with them? Especially if it's our culture / loyalty that instigated their rebellion!

Some people might like the fact that you can conquer a free city without a warmongering penalty but I say this is an instance where warmongering penalties should apply! A free city ought to have its freedom celebrated by the major civs, except perhaps the original civ and their allies, in which case conquering one ought to be seen as warmongering.

What I would really love is for a free city to start out as just a neutral city that you can't really interact with, much like in R+F at the moment, but which you aren't automatically at war with. You can DoW but there are warmongering penalties. If no-one conquers them or flips them to their civ for a while, maybe they can evolve into city states with a random set of suzerain bonuses applied, envoys, quests and so forth?

Maybe that last bit is too much. But at the very least, let them just be a neutral free city instead of a city of barbarians!

1. Free cities being at auto-war with nations aside the one from which they rebelled is nonsense.
2. Warmonger penalties for recapturing a free city that defected being seen as warmongering is also nonsense.

The most sensible outcome would be to only put the free city at war with the nation it breaks from. Others declaring on it get warmonger, overlord gets no additional warmonger (might well have some from initially capturing the city). Rulers wouldn't enjoy the idea of their own cities rebelling from them, after all. This is a different scenario than wars of conquest and should be treated differently, even from a pure gameplay perspective.

 

[Uberfrog]

Would making them into City states where you can't send envoys really be that difficult though?

I don't know, but I'm assuming it's not as simple as all that. Actual City States exist as non-player entities from the beginning of the game, and even when conquered retain their status as the capitals of minor civilisations for the purposes of liberation. Free cities do not exist at the start of the game, and can be brought into being and removed again in a short period of time in a way that cannot simply be predicted. Even if you didn't have to worry about envoys, I'm not sure how easy it is to implement something like that within the fundamental game structure.

 

[DonPato]

On one end I kind of have a problem with free cities going nuts and sending their units around killing things, but on the other end I kind of think of those particular instances as a powerful, rogue terrorist group. Maybe their militance is how they ended up becoming powerful enough to declare independence? We've seen this in the real world, for sure.

 

[Karpius]

I don't have an issue with the tactics but with the fact there's a perma-war status in the first place. I don't get why cities that want to break away from their parent civ are considered barbarians.

Although gamewise it may seem counter-intuitive, it does make some sense from a historical perspective.

One should view a "free city" as a territory that fell into some level of anarchy due to a breakdown of control from the central government. In such cases, it was not uncommon for banditry and raiding to ensue. One must remember that it was rarely the 'common people' who rebelled or tried to breakaway.

 

[Tech Osen]

Seems to be a bug, from what was said.

With the speed they are fixing bugs I guess we'll have to accept it as a feature for the forseeable future.

 

[Tech Osen]

Ok, for those trying to justify the aggressive behavior, this is from the civilopedia:

A Free City will repair pillaged improvements and spawn units to defend itself, and may build walls to defend itself. If attacked by a civilization, the Free City will try to retaliate against one of the civilization's cities. Otherwise it citizens pursue their own activities, waiting to see which civilization of the world will be most attractive to them.

 

[Animist7]

Ok, for those trying to justify the aggressive behavior, this is from the civilopedia:

A Free City will repair pillaged improvements and spawn units to defend itself, and may build walls to defend itself. If attacked by a civilization, the Free City will try to retaliate against one of the civilization's cities. Otherwise it citizens pursue their own activities, waiting to see which civilization of the world will be most attractive to them.

Now that I can get onboard with. Well it's good to know it's a bug rather than by design - hopefully it'll get fixed soon.