How is This Happening?

[steveg700]

I'm in a war with Polynesia, and with seemingly magical ease, they're flipping a CS to ally every turn or two. They declare war on me, and then ever someone else stages a coup and I have the opportunity to make peace, that civ is now Angry with me (-60 influence). Currently, I have nine at war with me.

This is pretty insanely crappy. They were making around 100 GPT before they DoW'ed. They have Partonage 2. Is that really enough to keep flipping cities constantly?

Also, I thought that the game was patched so that once you made peace with a city, your influence returned to what it would normally be. That's specifically supposed to prevent this cheap nonsense from happening. Was I mistaken?

 

[Ajuga]

I suspect they had a golden age. A lot of money in combination with some patronage policies can go a long way though it's very likely they didn't buy all their allies and that some simply flipped due to quests being completed.

 

[Heerlo]

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I think city state influence always goes back up when peace is made unless you declared war on the CS.

 

[Ajuga]

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I think city state influence always goes back up when peace is made unless you declared war on the CS.

That's true for GaK.

 

[steveg700]

Thanks, I was wondering if I was mistaken. I didn't declare war on it, unless maybe one of their ships was venturing way out of their territory and attacked me at some point and I swatted it back. I guess that would be a DoW? Don't recall that happening, but it's always possible.

I'm pretty sure I figured out what's happening. It's not something reasonable like a golden age cashflow surplus. It's just further proof of how poorly-implemented espionage is. Polynesia's just sending a spy to a CS, rigging an election, and then hitting the "Coup" button as soon as possible. If he fails, his spy just goes into the penalty box for a little while, so why not? I think I have 12 DoW's on me, and the cost to him was likely small.

I'm just gonna turn espionage off from now on. This is a game where balancing inputs to outputs are very crucial. You have to produce things with hammers, or pay gold, or expend a great person, or otherwise convert an input to an output. But with espionage, there is no input of hammers to build spies or gold to finance missions. They just do what they do, and if it works, free science or influence. If they fail, they get a short time out before they start doing it again. And I've lost faith in the "but everybody can do it" logic that seems to be the only counter-argument. If I'm getting a benefit, there needs to be some risk or expenditure.

 

[Browd]

Actually, failed coup results in death of the spy. A new spy is recruited within a matter of turns, but then needs to be assigned to a target city.

 

[steveg700]

Yep, that's what I said, Browd. The penalty for failure is a brief delay before you can go make for more freebies.

At any rate, I wound up just doing unto him until he finally sued for peace. Now we're just making coup stabs back and forth along with everyone else.

Thanks all. Thread over.

 

[sufficiency]

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I think city state influence always goes back up when peace is made unless you declared war on the CS.

I am not 100% sure if that's true. Sometimes I see a CS with significantly lowered CS after a war.

 

[Heerlo]

I am not 100% sure if that's true. Sometimes I see a CS with significantly lowered CS after a war.

Even when you didn't declare war on the CS? Well, you may be right.

I was just in a war with China(on G&K)where they declared war on me with two CS allies, and after I made peace with them I don't think the CSes were still mad at me. I don't know if it's always that way or not, though.

 

[steveg700]

Even when you didn't declare war on the CS? Well, you may be right.

I was just in a war with China(on G&K)where they declared war on me with two CS allies, and after I made peace with them I don't think the CSes were still mad at me. I don't know if it's always that way or not, though.

When the AI asks for peace, it usually(?) includes declaring peace with your respective CS allies. But sometimes some or none of the CS's get included, so you can wind up still at war with some.

And it does appear that if any of them are killed by your troops (even in a suicidal attack on you), they are angry. So, their far-roaming caravel slams into my heavily-promoted ironclad, they die, I'm at -60 influence. So it goes.

 

[Heerlo]

When the AI asks for peace, it usually(?) includes declaring peace with your respective CS allies. But sometimes some or none of the CS's get included, so you can wind up still at war with some.

And it does appear that if any of them are killed by your troops (even in a suicidal attack on you), they are angry. So, their far-roaming caravel slams into my heavily-promoted ironclad, they die, I'm at -60 influence. So it goes.

In my peace deal with China, peace with their CS allies was included. I don't remember for sure, but I don't think they were still mad at me.

But I don't think I actually fought them any during that war.