How Do I Keep the Peace?
- Thread starter eMel
- Start date
Always peace. You could just build units to prevent them declaring upon you as well
I was kinda hoping for a way to make them go easy on me while leaving me the option to go to war at my leisure.
Be big. (Not a setting, but a playstyle.) I'm not a top player myself and I like to keep my wars short: be big (8 cities preferably), culturally well developed (and make sure you can switch to war economy style real quick) and keep espionage rate at a reasonable level. Being (slightly) in the lead technologically also helps, but the key is diplomacy (again, being big helps here as well): if war breaks out, always check if you can bribe another civ to DOW on your enemy and always check if peace can be signed again.
Be big. (Not a setting, but a playstyle.) I'm not a top player myself and I like to keep my wars short: be big (8 cities preferably), culturally well developed (and make sure you can switch to war economy style real quick) and keep espionage rate at a reasonable level. Being (slightly) in the lead technologically also helps, but the key is diplomacy (again, being big helps here as well): if war breaks out, always check if you can bribe another civ to DOW on your enemy and always check if peace can be signed again.
Maybe that's part of my problem, or the whole problem: I tend to play England or Japan and stick with what I can build solely on their islands, so I can have 4 and 3 cities, respectively. And I never mess with diplomacy aside from seeking peace. Would my always refusing trade deals and open border treaties make other nations more likely to declare war?
I was kinda hoping for a way to make them go easy on me while leaving me the option to go to war at my leisure.
Speak softly but carry a big stick. In others words, if you have a large army most civs won't bother you. Keep an eye on your Power graph. In you're not in the top third then you're easy pickings and you will be declared on. If you're more powerful than the other civs, the only ones you'll need to worry about are the nut cases like Montezuma or Shaka.
azzaman333
meh
The best way to keep the peace, is make friends with the strongest religion. That still leaves you vulnerable to the minor religions, but that way you've got at least 3 or 4 powerful friends to back you up if you get attacked.
Also good.
Yup. You need at least 7-8 flourishing cities to stand your own ground. In other words:
Yup. You need at least 7-8 flourishing cities to stand your own ground. In other words:
No, religion is irrelevant. If you're weak your Buddhist brothers will still attack you regardless. It just may take them a bit longer to come to that decision. The only way to maintain some peace is to be able to hit back hard if anyone ever did declare. Which they won't for the most part. Except for Monty but he declares on everyone.
Sisiutil
All Leader Challenger
Yes. All your interactions with other leaders become part of your diplomatic score with them, which you can see by hovering the mouse over their leaderhead or their name at bottom right. A score that's "Cautious" or below increases the risk of war. Giving tribute/help when asked, trading resources and techs, etc. all contribute points in the "positive" column of your diplomatic score. Refusing requests, as you can imagine, adds to the "negative" side of the score.
Not entirely true. It depends on the leader.
As I mentioned above, you can decrease (though not eliminate) the chances of war by maintaining diplomatic scores at "Pleased" or "Friendly". Only a few leaders will declare war if they're pleased with you, and only a couple are psycho enough to declare when friendly (IIRC Catherine of Russia is the worst culprit here). Sharing a religion is one of the best ways to increase your diplomatic score with other leaders, so it can be relevant.
The problem is that having a different religion will worsen your score with the heathen leaders. It's good if you have several friends in the faith who will rush to your aid in the event of a war, but it won't prevent the DoW in the first place. The best way to reduce the chances of that is to be strong--maintain a decent-sized, up-to-date military (one of the surest ways to get your erstwhile "friends" to declare war on you is to look like a wimp). This is part of the challenge of the game, balancing out the guns and the butter in terms of both your research and your builds.
Supr49er
2011 Thunderfall Cup
Welcome to posting eMel. 
azzaman333
meh
An army does not prevent declarations of war, and if it does, you should be out using that army to kill something. Good diplomacy is the only way to survive if you don't intend to keep an invasion force prepared for an attack.
The power of the civ does not affect whether the AI is going to attack or not, unless their power is over their declaration threshold. IIRC, Monty can declare if you're less than 1.5 times more powerful than him. It doesn't matter whether your power is 0.5 times as big, or 1.45 times as big, he'll still attack.
Granted that sharing a religion will boost your diplomatic standing with a civ but that's doesn't make it a guarentee that they won't declare on you. You may have all sorts of other negative modifiers happening that cancel your bonuses from religion, and simply sharing the same faith isn't going to prevent them from going to war.
It most certainly does. Having a large military is the best way of avoiding having someone declare on you. As to what you should be doing with it, there's lots of reasons why someone may not be out attacking. You can't wage perpetual warfare in this game, War Weariness and your economy prevent that. And some players don't necessarily prefer playing a warmonger style. But a strong military is still the best deterrant to being declared on.
azzaman333
meh
Wrong, the best deterrant is good diplomacy. As I said, an army does not deter the AI attacking unless you're above their declaration limit. Apart from that, having an army is irrelevant to the decision to go to war.
I've been attacked plenty of times by civs that were Pleased with me simply because they were stronger than I was. Diplomacy is absolutely no guarentee.
azzaman333
meh
But they don't attack because you are weak.
conception
Warlord
- Joined
- Dec 26, 2008
- Messages
- 193
Obviously the best way to keep the peace is to vassalize everybody.
That's what I'm doing in my latest game with only 2 more civs to go. As long as my people know I'm going to war to provide for long-standing peace, everyone is happy.
Scoottr
Prince
Get the BUG mod. It shows you your power ranking.
Based on the use of the mod and this ranking I can tell you definately that war comes to you when your military is weak. The mod shows you a ratio of your strength (units, buildings, etc) against theirs. When this ratio hits .5 you will be attacked by those not of your religion. Lower than that and even those of your religion will attack you.
Plain and simple fact, but you have to have the mod to be able to see it happening.
Based on the use of the mod and this ranking I can tell you definately that war comes to you when your military is weak. The mod shows you a ratio of your strength (units, buildings, etc) against theirs. When this ratio hits .5 you will be attacked by those not of your religion. Lower than that and even those of your religion will attack you.
Plain and simple fact, but you have to have the mod to be able to see it happening.
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